@Michael Sato thanks I appreciate the help, any little help counts

Option periods are not counted by the lender because they are not set in stone and a renewal might not happen.

Value of 4 unit buildings is solely derived from the neighborhood comps and then adjusted for quality and room count. 

I know you can't count on appreciation but it's highly likely.2. do we put down 20% if we are living in it or try to use as little of our own money as possible?

Perhaps a full time job + RE investments would count to some extent.5.

From what I've been gathering in my on-going education in real estate investing is that when you are evaluating the multi-family property you plan to reside in and rent out the other units, you treat it as if you weren't living in it and count the rent when calculating the gross income and cash flow.

HI Allan,First of all you can cash out to 75% as a non owner property if its considered 1-4 financed properties (up to 6 with freddie mac) assuming you're planning for a conventional financing route and this is a 1-4 unit residential property since commercial or multifamily will go off different guidelines.Seeing that you have 4 partners, the "financed property," count will go off the partner who has the most financed properties so you may end up funding in the name or the most favorable partner and may decide to deed/transfer the ownership up according to your perogative (legal question seek professional help).Some states have transfer or excise taxes to do this so be sure to know first for your state before initiating these transfers.

You can certainly do it cheaper if you do all you can by yourself; if you don't count the time you put in.

It sounds like you're using 1 hard money guy---a private person around here that lends to you... so you can count on him to fund.

Appreciation is not counted as income because it does not exist unless you sell or refinance.