This number will give you indication of you will have lots of gain in equity to distribute or if you will have little equity to distribute.

I am with Jay, sounds like you found a seller finance deal with $50k in equity because it needs $50k in repairs. 

If I got your numbers right, you would have ($235,000 - $135,000 - $12,000) or $88,000 in equity and it looks like it would cash flow pretty well too.

If you are a new investor, probably you will not have a lot of assets and/or equity to worry about (but even that is relative and subjective to each person tolerance to risk) so I would not worry about that till you pass that risk threshold (in my opinion 100K+ in equity, maybe 50K if you are really risk adverse).

I have roughly around $140,000 in equity. 

.- Assuming a $200k house with 20% down and $200/mo cashflow,  - If you throw cashflow at mortgage every month, you will pay it off in 20.5 yrs as opposed to 30  - You definitely increase net worth faster by doing this (an extra $3,948 at year 10, which is pretty small, but still something compared to the total $24,000 cash you would have saved over the course of 10yrs at $200/mo)  - You hit $80k in equity at 6yrs 5mo as opposed to 6yrs 8mo    - this is the real advantage because it allows you to acquire another property faster, but there is a very small difference here- Overall, I would say following about this strategy:  - only do it if you are confident that low-interest fixed-loans will be available 6-10yrs down the road when you would be looking to refi    - would be a shame to lose that advantage for the small extra advantage of paying down mortgage over that time period  - this still seems like a no-risk, no-tax savings account or bond    - instead of parking extra income (from job or whatever) at bank with minimal returns while waiting to buy another property, "invest the money in your mortgage" by paying it down   - I suspect this strategy might start to look better if you had an extra $1-2k/mo from job to put into this to really supercharge equity which is what David was talking about in book, but I'd have to crunch numbers more           - of course, have to make sure that refi closing costs won't wipe out any gains, and you don't risk losing a low rate fixed loan as @Robert Purcell said    - also, I suspect that nominal stock market returns of 7-10%/yr would outperform this (even with capital gains) because the money will be invested for 6yrs before pulling out for a new down payment (which means long-term capital gains as opposed to short-term and you have a better chance to smooth out stock market cycles so portfolio doesn't crash when you want to liquidate and use it as a down payment for property), but I'd have to crunch numbers more- Interesting idea to tune results, but I don't think I'll use it any time soon.

I refinanced my house in November and gained 70k in equity in 5 years and knew there was money to be made here somewhere.

I am thinking of selling one my properties in California that has 200k in equity in order to to a 1031 exchange and purchase a MFR.

I see no compelling evidence that buy and hold forever can produce real returns on capital north of what can be had in equities markets with very few exceptions.

I think the smarter play is to sell them all, do a 1031 exchange, and consolidate into a larger multi-family apartment complex.You'll get all of your equity (not just what you can refi out), gain economies of scale, and simplify your management going forward.With ~$1.155mm in equity you can reasonably look at $3.5-$4mm properties.