1 Year Self-Employed Tax Return

[Brad Voisin]

Hey Guys, 

First time posting here but have listened to 50+ Bigger Pockets Real Estate Podcasts and have fallen in love with the idea of real estate. My wife and I (26 years old) have lived in apartments renting for too long and have decided to make the first step into getting into a house. We've had great success with airbnb for 15 months now and plan to continue doing the same and rent as well in our next property. Here's our situation, we we're originally pre-qualified by our local credit union a week ago and found a single family property we love a couple days later with our buyer's agent whom we've been to 12-15 properties with. The property has 4 separate entrances and essentially 3 separate living spaces with relatively minimal work required; couple inside doors, add cabinets, sink and stove to complete a mother in-law. We submitted an offer and received a counter 24 hours later and accepted and went under contract. Later that day, the credit union came back to us and decided they were hesitant about submitting a pre-approval and asked for a co-signer due to less than ideal income from 2018's return. Wife's income showed $24k and my self-employed (first tax return self-employed) showed $23k. I'm on track to do just sightly more than double my income for this year but being self-employed with no CPA, I have no way of proving to the bank my self-employed income has grown significantly in 12 months. Naturally, we're had no luck finding a family member willing to co-sign with us so we're desperately looking for any kind of solution, alternative, legal work-around, etc. and would be extremely grateful for any and all input anyone may have. Settlement date, as it stands is 1 month from today. Thanks in advance.

Brad