First-time buyers
First-Time Homebuyer Hacks
What a lender actually reads, the quiet mistakes that sink first-time files, and five moves to make before you apply.
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Guide · First home to portfolio
How to Build a Portfolio the Smart Way: From First Time Homebuyer to Ten Properties
You bought your first home to live in it, and you will. Then, done the right way, it can become the first of several. This guide is the whole climb, and the rules that decide whether you climb or stall.
Who it is for: Anyone who bought, or is about to buy, a first home with a small down payment and wants it to be the first of many.
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Why it matters
Not a loophole: the rules, used in order
Every owner-occupied mortgage carries a promise to move in and live there as your main home for a set time. Once that promise is kept, you can keep the loan, rent the home out and buy the next one the same way.
Most people stall at the second house. The lender still counts the payment on the first one, a recent change affects how its rent can be counted, and reserves become the gate on every move. Pretending to move in is mortgage fraud: the ladder works because the promise is kept, not dodged.
What the guide covers
- The rule that makes the ladder legal
- The order of loans, year by year
- What the old payment does to the next file, under the newest rules
- The reserves to stage before each move
- When to stop moving and buy rentals outright, and the property limit many investors hit by surprise
- The mistakes that end the climb, and ten questions to ask before each move
The honest part. The ladder is simple to describe and easy to fall off, usually on the reserves or on a house that will not rent for enough.
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