Also I would be quitting my job when the construction starts.

He is willing to sell the house or assign/quit claim deed the property to me..

There's no reason that you should have to eat the fees associated with tenant screening.

However, I do know Kingston quite well.

I just have to put this out there because I was taking quite a bit of flak from one of the members on here who said a conventional refi could not be done with only 6 mos seasoning.Not only did another BP member just complete a refi on their investment property after 6 mos, but they did it as a cash out refi to boot.So there's the answer as to whether you can do a conventional refi after 6 mos of seasoning.

I have some opportunities in the area, primarily condos, either near Microsoft, or in downtown Tacoma, which is a market that appears to be on the fringe of taking off.The issue I have is that buying this place will eat up a lot of my seed money.

Does the bank eat it?

As you mentioned, there are quite a few folks that start investing in real estate while still on active duty, and I'm glad that I've got a resource like this to help get me started!

My original point was a caution to account for the increase in taxes in a purchase decision.Having said that, there are lots of appeals and quite a few successful ones.

Sometimes, it's much easier to purchase properties because you may not have to jump as many hoops or pluck down quite as much as a bank would require you to.