Out of state move & looking to purchase a 4 unit to house hack.
Hey BP community. My wife and I are about to go through a big move to another state (Marquette, Michigan). My wife will be attending Northern Michigan University this August. We currently live in Illinois, just west of Chicago, and have been here for the last 4 years. Our goal is to purchase a 2-4 unit property in Marquette in an attempt to house hack and save on expenses. I have not done any deals yet, but have wanted to for a while now and finally decided to start taking action. We purchased our first home in December of 2016, here in Illinois, for $171,000. Just a little over a year later it is worth roughly 200K. I used a VA loan to purchase our home and was shocked to see how much it has gone up in value in just over the year that we've been here. I have thought about renting out the house once we move, but the numbers aren't great so I will most likely sell.
I recently found a 4 unit property on Craigslist in Marquette for $315,000. It is fully rented and brings in $3,125 per month. I emailed the seller for information on the property. It is an older gentleman who has owned the property for 20 or 30 years. He is looking to retire and move south. I don't blame him as the winters in the UP are rough. The property is in great shape at least from the pictures. Zillow's zestimate on the property is around $260,000, so I think the price can be haggled down a bit. I ran some numbers through the BP calculator and if my wife and I lived in one of the 1B, 1B units at a purchase price of $290,000 we would cash flow $25 a month living rent free. From my analysis it seems like a pretty good deal. My goal would be to use a VA loan to purchase the property but we are still in our home and will probably not be leaving for Marquette till June-July. I hate to let something like this pass, and am really just looking for advice on what we should do! We do not have much savings at the moment as we have been putting money into updating our current home. Should I contact the seller and tell him thanks and wait for another opportunity down the road, or find a way to pursue this? The property is located 6 blocks from the college in the heart of downtown!
Thanks in advance for any and all advice.
Best,
Tony