Looking for advice on what to do with large gift we revieved.

[Ronald Morris]

Hi Everyone,

I just wanted to get everyone's opinion on my and my family's property situation. We own no properties but had planned on buying a few this year. We recently were gifted a house that we cannot use as a rental. Were also moving to the Denver area from California ideally by the end of this quarter, and the CA home will be sold and used for the new home.

Here's the dilemma.

After the house in CA is sold, we figure we will walk with a minimum of 800k with a more realistic number around 900k. Because of how the house was transferred to us in December, we're not sure a 1031 exchange will work though we're looking into it.

As for what we're looking for. I would like to start with MF 2-4 units. With that being said, I wouldn't object to a SFR and doing STR. All rentals will be within an hour of Denver, and once we get the process of buying down and we can confirm we like being landlords OOS will become an option.

Options:

Buy 500-600k primary with cash, then use the remaining balance on rentals. From there, we will use the equity in our primary to buy more after were more established.

Use the full 800k to buy the primary, then when were settled, use home equity for rentals.

House hacking isn't much of an option.

FHA is possible though were on only one income for now.

To round things off, I will be graduating in Feb with a BA in computer science and no debt. My wife is in the tech field as well, with a gross income of 95k.

I'm sure there are other options we are not thinking of, but we wanted to get everyone's opinion. Thanks for reading, and please don't hesitate to ask for any clarifications or more details.

[Dave Foster]

@Ronald Morris, depending on how the transfer occurred you may or may not be able to 1031 as you said.But it also may make your sale of it tax free.  It all depends on the details of it.  But I think you'll be able to go one way or the other.