All Forum Posts by: Elaine C.

Hi everyone! Thanks for the insights. Looks like finding a partner or a portfolio lender is the way to move forward (or delay for a bit while my income steadies). Now to do research on portfolio lenders... Thanks! 

I am financially stable, but I went freelance about two years ago. The first 1.5 years I didn't make much money and took out from my savings to pay the mortgage on my primary residence. I've started making a good income doing freelance this year (6 mo worth) and I've been learning about REI for cash flow and was hoping to start this year. However, I live in an expensive city (Seattle) and although I can afford a downpayment on an investment property, I don't seem to qualify for a mortgage if I do bc banks take the average income of the last 24 months to determine ability to pay. Given I've only been making money for the last 6 months freelance, this isn't working in my favor. So, I'm in a weird situation where I can't get a mortgage and I don't qualify for things like FHA (at least, as far as I understand FHAs).

What are my options? It seems like hard money doesn't work as they are high interest and short term, and what I need is exactly the opposite. I DON'T have enough money buy a house here cash-in-full, so that's not an option either. Any thoughts? I feel like I'm stuck in this weird in-between so any ideas would be helpful.

Thanks! 

Hi Elliott! It's difficult to find a stable property here that I can rent out for positive cash flow if buying at market rates. I've been given the advice that the best approach in the Seattle market would be to rehab/add value to a property, but again, I'm super new so trying to learn the analysis aspect first!

Yes, but it requires you to know/guess your rehab costs and ARV, which again, I have zero feel for. They also have a lot of other numbers that I don't have any idea how to find. And I don't think the forum would appreciate me uploading 50 trial analyses. Even I would be annoyed by me...

I'm very new to REI and I'm having trouble understanding how to think about the numbers and evaluate a property. I have it on my "business plan" to run numbers for 50 potential properties, but that won't help me if I can't determine if I'm doing it correctly. What is the best way to get your numbers "checked"?

I have read the advice of joining a local REIA in my area (Seattle). There are a few. Does anyone have recommendations or thoughts on which of them are the most active.

Thanks in advance!