All Forum Posts by: Caleb Gray

Hello all!

I'm looking for my first property (live-in duplex, triplex, or fourplex) and after running the numbers, I found one that cash-flowed pretty well for a reasonable price at conservative estimates (plus my wife loves the house). However, after discussing more with the realtor it was disclosed that the landlord was responsible for water and gas, which very much destroyed the cash flow I thought I had. The property is a triplex, converted out of an old house that's been taken care of very well (as far as I can see without a building inspector), so the water and gas are not split out into separate meters for the tenants (electrical is).

In order to make this deal work, I'd love to figure out a way to invoice the tenants for those utilities. I've thought about splitting the water bill out proportionately to the number of tenants and then the gas bill by square footage of the units. That seems to be the most fair for the water, but since I think the gas is used not only for heat but also for stoves/ovens, I'm curious to see if anyone has another way of splitting this out.

Any thoughts?

Thanks!

Caleb

Hello all,

I was wondering if anyone out there had any experience with Unison (https://www.unison.com/)? I'm a first time home buyer looking for a mutli- family property, but due to property-taxes in my area being fairly high and rent levels stagnating a bit, I need all the help I can get to make my monthly mortgage payment as low as possible.

Unison apparently matches a 10% down payment in exchange for that equity in your home even though you're 100% in control of the home. They're like a partner. They share the gain if/when you sell as well as the loss, and you can also buy them out later.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

Caleb

@Jerry Padilla that's great. So basically, I should just call or email the mortgage lender again to ask but it's likely that I could move forward with getting pre-approved right now with just the offer letter?

Awesome, thanks @Chris Mason! 

Hello there,

I recently (last week) started a new job with a 50% salary increase (going from 50K - 90K, from a not-for-profit startup to a much more established not-for-profit). I'm looking into options for financing a first house and met with a mortgage banker about 4 months ago before the job search happened. I put most of the house hunting on hold while the job situation was settling out, but now that I have it set, I wanted to know when is the best time to re-engage with the mortgage banker? They required the last 2 months of pay-stubs when I went in earlier, and I haven't been on long enough to get paid yet at the new job.

I'd like to get into that first house (mutli-family property) before next fall, so I have some time, but I also don't want to wait around if I don't have to. I'm also going to explore other creative ways to make this work in the meantime.

Any advice on this one?

Thanks,

Caleb

Hello! 

My name is Caleb Gray and I've done a lot of light reading of BiggerPockets for the last few months including several forum discussions related to small, multi-family properties as well as the Ultimate Beginner's Guide. After a crazy summer of figuring out a new direction for my career, I'm getting started on all of the things I was putting off while in-transition, including looking for my first house!

I'm hoping to start out like many people here probably have, with a small multi-family property (ideally 3-4 units) with little or no money-down (currently reading Brandon's book on the subject). I'd like to get started soon (within the next year) because my wife and I already have 1 child and are looking to grow our family. Waiting too long would disqualify the live-in option and that's the most attractive to me right now.

I currently work as a web developer and love being active with side-projects in my spare time. I'd love to grow this real estate investing side hustle to the point that I could scale back my web development role to part time or only on a consulting basis (I really enjoy the work so I don't want to quit outright, but I have so many other side projects I'd love to do! 40+ hours a week really eats into that.) If anyone needs some short-term web development contracting, whether it be maintenance on a current website or consulting on a new site, I would interested in chatting.

Looking forward to networking with all of you, and if you're local to the Sycamore/DeKalb area it'd be great to meet up!

Thanks,

Caleb