Housing costs are a significant expense, gobbling up around 37% of most American’s take home pay- other categories don’t even come close! Spending less on housing will have an inordinate impact on the amount of money you’re able to save and invest, and house hacking is one of the best ways to achieve this goal. House hacking is a tactic that everyone should consider- whether you pay rent or have a mortgage, you’re a candidate for transforming a monthly expense into a source of revenue. Listen as we demystify some different approaches to house hacking as well as our personal experience with this valuable practice.
Additional resources from this episode:
- Hosting on Airbnb is one of the most popular ways to house hack these days and I would highly recommend it! Here’s the link for my Airbnb in Atlanta if you’re looking for a place to stay.
- Joel is another step closer to building an ADU (accessory dwelling unit) in his backyard so that he can get back to house hacking.
- If you’re working with a realtor who has an MLS Listings search set up for you- make sure that your search filter includes multi-family properties (duplex, triplex, etc) as they’re not often included as most folks are only looking at single-family properties.
- And house hacking can be as simple as finding a roommate. For that try sites like cirtru, PadMapper (download the app for Android or iOS and select the “Post” tab to create a listing), and there’s always Craigslist!
During this episode we enjoyed Mosaic Coyote by Yellowhammer Brewing- a big thanks to Matt’s dad, Tim, for donating these beers to the show this week! And if you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe and give us a quick review in Apple Podcastsor wherever you get your podcasts- we’d love to hear from you.
Best friends out!
I am a prospective first time homebuyer and have been interested in the idea of purchasing a multifamily home for some time. Your podcast has helped fuel this interest and offered some great insight. The big hurdle is I am early in my career and on paper would not qualify for a home of this value though would be within my budget if the extra spaces were to be rented out. Do you two have any insight of how to tackle this hurdle of being approved for a loan for a multifamily home as a first time buyer? Is it a better option to look for a house with a mother-in-law potential instead?
Hey Brian- it sounds like the timing of this episode was just right for you, I’m glad you found it!
So there’s still a good chance for you to get approved for a loan, but it just won’t be through some of the automated online lenders like Rocket Mortgage. Instead you’ll have to find a lender locally who is willing to look at more than just your basic debt to income, and will instead consider the revenue from house hacking as well. I can’t remember the specifics, but at one point I remember having to provide some basic comps of what rentals were going for in the area since that was the purpose behind buying that investment property. My lender who I’m pretty sure was a local credit union, took that into account and approved. Hope that helps!