I don't think there's any terms of the loan that are beneficial on a commercial loan to live in the property.

Which is beneficial to people like you who are wanting to tap into new markets to generate respective cash flow.

Since this is our first project like this, I'd love opinions from those with more experience...do you see fatal flaws with the strategy, are we missing the boat on anything huge, etc. 

I focus on low-moderate income residential and have seen a huge increase in value across our holdings over the past 3-5 years, so we wrestle with selling all the time. 

It's just so important (at least in my opinion) to get started sooner than later - compound interest is no joke and definitely makes a huge difference in real estate.Do you have any idea where you want to start looking in Chicago? 

What that means is your insurance is likely to go up regardless of if you claim, f there is a huge claim event in the area. 

What I KNOW is that having a mentor in the short term would be beneficial.

Many sellers believe asking them to finance seems like a lose-win scenario for them and that they are doing you a huge favor.

David,Atlanta has some great opportunities, but hedge funds are investing huge sums of money into the market right now.I invest in North Georgia, in the mountain areas, which are less affected by outside investors. 

You do have the option to pay more than 3.5% out of pocket to make up the difference between the purchase price and the max loan limit, which might make sense if it's not a huge difference You also may have the option to use a piggyback loan to cover the difference between between the FHA loan limit and the purchase price.