S2 E42: Building a Portfolio With Your VA Loan | What Actually Works (and What Doesn't)

You have read the investor books. You know the strategies.


Now let's talk about what actually works when your financing tool is a VA loan and you are an active-duty military member trying to build long-term wealth on a military timeline.


In this episode of Closing Chapters, Brittney breaks down the real landscape of building a real estate portfolio using VA loan benefits, straight from her experience working with four single soldiers all headed to Fort Bragg with the same goal: buy a house now and keep it as a rental when they move again. She walks through what the VA loan actually requires in terms of property condition, why the negotiation tactics from popular investing books often don't translate to VA purchases, and what strategies she has seen work in the real world, including house hacking and loan assumption.


Brittney also shares her own portfolio story: six doors, including a quad, approaching retirement with options and financial stability that took years of intentional decisions to build. If you are a military member or spouse wondering whether building a rental portfolio during your service years is actually possible, this episode gives you the honest, experience-backed answer. It is possible. It just looks different than the books describe.


 Key Takeaways

• VA loans have specific property condition requirements. Missing flooring, wood rot, holes in walls, and absent appliances are all disqualifiers. Knowing this upfront saves time and inspection money.
• The sales price is not where you win. Getting $10,000 in seller concessions is worth more to a cash-light buyer than a $10,000 price reduction, which only saves about $60 per month.
• House hacking is the most accessible portfolio-building strategy for VA buyers right now. A roommate paying $800 per month can dramatically accelerate equity paydown and offset your mortgage.
• VA loan assumption is a real option if you have the cash to bridge the equity gap. It takes more patience but can lock in a low rate and strong equity position from day one.
• You can hold two VA loans at the same time if you have enough remaining eligibility. The third is where it typically gets sticky.
• Location matters for future rental viability. A cheap house in the wrong neighborhood is not a portfolio. It is a liability.
• Breaking even on a rental is not failure. It is a foundation. The equity builds whether the cash flow does or not.
• Building a portfolio is a long game. The goal is options at retirement, not instant cash flow from purchase.
  
  🎧 If this episode opened your eyes to what is actually possible with your VA loan, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a fellow service member who is thinking about building a portfolio. This is the conversation most people are not having, and it matters.

Closing Chapters Podcast: Where Every Mission Has A Story

Thanks for listening. We talk all things military real estate, my transactions, the mistakes, the wins, and simple plays you can use right now.

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• Buying or selling near Fort Bragg & Moore County
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Disclaimer: This podcast education only & is not legal, tax, or financial advice. Talk with your own pros about your situation. Opinions are my own.

© 2025 Brittney Frye. All rights reserved. Realtor, license # 352197 in NC. Brokerage: REAL Broker l Military Division

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey there friend! Welcome back to the closing chapters podcast where every mission has a story. I actually used to tell my husband all the time, I wanted to go overseas. And we it was gonna be probably our last PCS, and he's like, I'm not retiring overseas. That sounds horrible. I don't want to have to try to find a job from being overseas. Nobody's gonna hire me. We're not gonna be able to find a house or have anywhere to go. And my argument always was like, the worst case scenario, the worst scenario is that we go back to our OG house that we bought in 2015. Hello, hello friends, welcome back. We're in a little bit of a new setting. If you couldn't tell, I guess the only big difference you would notice is that my sign is missing and there's different curtains. But we have shifted things around and I now have a new office space in my home. So welcome to my new space at the moment. I have an interesting topic that I want to talk to you about today, and that is this idea of investing with your VA loom. And this might be a little controversial or not be exactly what you want to hear, but I'm going to tell you some realities, at least from my business and what I have seen or what we have experienced personally. Okay. So I am working with four buyers right now that are all single soldiers coming to Fort Bragg area and all would like to start their portfolio, aka they would like to buy their first house and be able to start keeping it as a rental and build a portfolio as they move through the military during their career. Okay. I love this client. I love being able to educate them and make a plan and show them a way forward. I think this is an amazing tool, whether you plan on having a full career in the military or not. It gives you flexibility. It gives you stability for so many reasons. So, flexibility-wise, if you have properties that you can utilize and liquidate in the future, then we have flexibility when we're getting out of the military, retirement or not. Can we cash flow? Do we sell and get a lump sum of cash at that point, five, 10 plus years down the road, when we have some good equity in our home? It gives you options and mobility. Oh, by the way, when you get out of the military, let's say you purchased a home and it's somewhere that you would come back to or that you land up at, then you have options like of I can go back to this property. And knowing that you could afford your property with a fixed income, so to speak. This is something we talk about gravely. I actually used to tell my husband all the time, I wanted to go overseas. And we, it was gonna be probably our last PCS. And he's like, I'm not retiring overseas. That sounds horrible. I don't want to have to try to find a job from being overseas. Nobody's gonna hire me. We're not gonna be able to find a house or have anywhere to go. And my argument always was like, the worst case scenario, the worst scenario is that we go back to our OG house that we bought in 2015. The mortgage is $1,500 a month on it. We can 100% live off of your retirement alone, without another job, without disability, any of that in queue. We know that we can survive under that roof with your retirement pay. I was like, that's the worst case scenario, is that we have to go back to that house for a little while and regroup on life. What a wonderful worst case scenario. We have options, right? We do not get to go overseas. Obviously, we are here in beautiful North Carolina and we love where we are at, so it's all good. But that is the true nature of this situation, is that we have options of where we could go and what we could do. Now we have two different properties that we could shift back into if we had to. And that's still conversation to this day. We are at the point where we will be retiring within the next year or so. And because of that, it creates a little bit of a disruption in housing needs, right? We are currently in a rental. And oh, by the way, if you didn't know, when you are within your 12-month window of getting out of the military, you cannot use your VA loan without additional income that you can prove. So that can be very sticky. This is something that's very hard for a lot of people that are getting out of the military, is they want to go back home or move somewhere and buy a house until you have another job situated or somebody else has income that can be verified and it's enough to cover the cost of the house, then you're a sitting duck. So it may not be fun to make some of these choices. It may not be fun for us to have to decide to go back to one of our previous homes for a little while because neither one of them are in the areas that we envision ourselves staying at. But if that is a temporary stepping stone and we have that to fall back on, what a wonderful solution. And that's all there is to it. And it doesn't have to be forever. But if it gets us where we need to go for the interim, and then we can regroup once we are on the other side of retirement, then so be it. We'll figure it out and life will go on. So that is the true nature of like the end-all-be-all simple reasons why building a portfolio is absolutely amazing while you were in the military. Okay. Now, the reality is that a lot of times people are reading these books about investing and how you're gonna waggle a deal and you just have to not care, and you just put in whatever offer, and somebody's gonna take your offer along the way. That's fantastic if you have cash or a hard money loan and you can do conventional or no loan contingency at all, aka like cash, where you don't have to have an appraised value and the house doesn't have to be in a set condition. If you are planning on using a VA loan, which all four of my clients are right now, then the scenario changes a lot. Okay. There are criteria for us to be able to get a VA loan. So, no, you may not buy a house that has missing flooring. No, you may not buy a house that has wood rot all over the exterior. No, you may not buy a house that has holes in the wall, albeit all of those could be very easy things to fix, but they do not pass the VA loan criteria. So if there is not somebody on the other side of that house that is willing to do those things, and if they were willing to do those things, they probably would have done it before the house was listed, unless it's minor. But I'm talking like when we know a whole room is missing flooring and it's listed as is, or we see pieces of boards falling off of a house, or a roof, the ceiling inside is caving in. There's a good chance nobody's fixing that. You may not use your VA loan to purchase that property. So, what does that mean? From my perspective, that means we're finding properties that have to be in decent condition. They can be ugly, they don't have to be updated, but they have to be in reasonable condition. They have to be a sound home. It has to have an operating stove and more than likely HVAC unit if that system is provided with the house. There are certain things that they have to check the box with. If you have stairs on the exterior and interior, but mainly the exterior is where I run into this. On the exterior of your house and it's more than three steps, it must have railings. If there is somebody that's not going to do those items, then how are you getting a VA loan? You're simply not, unless you're willing to try to find a way for you to do those repairs and the seller to allow it. And then even if the deal doesn't go through, you've lost that money or repairs or whatever. That's a sticky situation to be in. Okay. So that means we're finding reasonable properties, which means we're not finding the most raggedy and cheapest properties on the market. Now, we can find a deal. There is something in everyone's price point for the most part that is available. It just means that we probably have to honor the price a little bit. And there are so many tools and ways to know how to go about this. But let's say somebody purchased a house two or three years ago with a VA loan, that's a great indicator that we're on a good path forward. Like this house, as long as it's been maintained, should be able to get a VA loan. They have one. Great. That's a great first step. Now, the flip side of that is if they've only been in the house two or three years, then we look at what they purchased it for. We're adding in the funding fee, and then we're taking back the numbers, right? Like, so I'm putting in an amortization spreadsheet and I'm saying, okay, they've been in the house for 36 months. What would the mortgage be? Like, what should on average their payoff be right now? Okay. So if I know how much they owe on it, then I can backtrack what the commissions would possibly be, how much we would possibly be asking in seller concessions, what their taxes would be prorated, and potentially the normal attorney's fees for the deed to be drawn up and the transfer tax fees. And so once we look at that, we can see whether a seller can actually handle a drop in the price at all. There are so many of them that are actually literally priced just where they can clear the house. So you have to make options. It's not reasonable to say, hey, Mr. Seller, I want to give you $10,000 less than the list price, but I want you to cover my buyer's agent commission and I want you to give me all of my seller concessions. And oh, by the way, you're gonna be negative $20,000, and that's just supposed to be okay. No, no. One, I've said this before, but we are here to take care of our friends, our brothers and sisters in arms, okay? We are not here to rip the rug out from underneath each other, right? There needs to be a trade-off and there should be help to be had between each other, 100%. So my thing that I say to my sellers is like, hey, when you bought, what was the scenario, right? Somebody paid for the commission for you, probably. Somebody offered a little bit of seller concessions for you and helped you along the way. Because we all know that cash is hard to come by sometimes, right? And that's what we end up needing help with the most. So be a reasonable human being and expect that. Expect to pass that back along to the next person within reason. But buyers, you can't expect a seller to want to go into the negative to sell their house. That is an unreasonable expectation. Does it happen sometimes? Yes, it does. I happen to feel like that's very unfortunate. I don't love that scenario at all. That is not the purpose of home ownership, okay? And you would not like it either if you were on that side of the fence. So don't be harsh, like be a reasonable person. And we can talk through those scenarios and see what that looks like. But you need to understand that if you are purchasing a house that one you are going to live in as your primary residence, then it needs to be in livable condition when you're purchasing it. So you don't want to buy the big fixer-up or house that you literally can't move into right now because it's disgusting, right? You'll need somewhere that you can actually move into. And then if there's some projects to do along the way, awesome. Two, if you're wanting to use a VA loan, it has to be VA eligible. The house just has to be. And I will help you with that. We will walk through properties and I will tell you, hey, this is a red flag to me. I don't know if an appraiser would pass for this. Now, here's the other thing that's really, really hard if you are sitting in the realtor seat, okay? Appraisals are done by humans and there are guidelines, but there's no end-all be-all. A lot of it is opinion-based. So what each person values or doesn't value or is a stickler on could be very different. So a lot of times I will say, like, hey, this is something that could be called out by an appraiser. I wouldn't be too concerned about it until it happens, but you need to understand that I've had this happen before. I've had an appraiser call out that rails need to be put in on stairs. On a house that was with a VA loan, when we sold it, it was required. When we purchased it, it was not. Not me like my client, right? So every appraiser can have something different to say. Maybe one appraiser is not going to be so concerned about the wood rot on your doorframe. Another one is absolutely going to require for it to be replaced. So my job is to understand what the guidelines are, what I've run into over this past decade working with VA loans and to prepare you for that. Now, I would be really silly to be like, yeah, sure, let's put in an offer on this house that I can tell you 100% bar none. An appraiser is not coming in here passing it for a VA loan. It doesn't have the appliances in place. The power is not on. It's as is, it's missing flooring, the ceilings falling in. It's not passing for a VA loan. So you have a choice to make. You're either going to change your financing type, or we need to move on. And I also am not going to continually put in really crappy offers. I'm just not. Now I will show you what's reasonable. I will show you the numbers. I will do a comparable market analysis and show you what is out there and what is normal for that area or what has sold in the past three to six months because that's factual. We can do something with that. I will show you a proposed seller net sheet. Even if you're my buyer, I think that's the best thing we can do is look at it through the seller's eyes and see where they're going to end up at. And how would you feel if that was you? Would it be reasonable to you? And then that's a good place to start, right? So these are the type of things that I'm going to do if you're working with me. And I'm I need you to understand that I want you to get the best deal you possibly can because I want you to build a portfolio just like I have. We wish we had more. We really had a big goal of having 10 doors before we retired. And that's not going to happen. We are at six, and that is probably where we're going to be at when we retire. And that's okay. And that's one of them is a quad. So four doors and one building, and then we have two single-family houses. We are very blessed with what we've got going on. We are absolutely blessed. And we are going to have options when we retire. So job accomplished in that facet. However, we wish we would have been able to do this a little bit earlier on and been a little bit more tactical about it and had more mobility and maybe more income by this time from those properties. But that's okay. You might have that opportunity, but we got to get you started, right? So, my point in saying all of this is that there's always other options too. And the price, I will promise you that sales price is not where you're winning. It is not. And I can prove it to you day in and day out with my amortization spreadsheet. Yes, I am a little numbers nerd to a degree. I don't know all the details and ins and outs of the stock market and how that's affecting the mortgage rates and the ins and outs on the back end of the mortgage. I've got a guy for that, and he's amazing at looking at all that information and breaking it down in a way that you can digest it. That's not my gig, and I stay out of it. However, I have this wonderful spreadsheet that does help me work the numbers and know like where we would be at price point wise, how much extra do we need to pay to get your payment down to where we want it to be in the next three to five years? That I can work with all day long, and that is my strategy, right? But the thing I want to tell you, and I've shown this before on one of my other episodes, I'll have to find it and link it. When you play with the sales number, the sales price, it does not dictate your payment that much. You can drop the sales price, $10,000, and it's taking off like 60 to max $100 off of your payment a month. Okay. How many months at $100 even, $100 a month, how many months would it take you to get back $10,000? Now, if you could pay full price for that house, pay $100 extra on your payment a month and get $10,000 and seller concessions instead. $10,000 that you are not pulling out of your bank account and bringing to the table. $10,000 that you can spend on a fridge, on a fence, on moving, on upgrades in the house, or just to comfortably get settled and have a buffer, okay, that's the win. That is the win, my friend. Cash is king. Having cash gives you opportunities. Now, if we are messing with a sales price and saving you 60 bucks a month, and then I'm spending $10,000 of your cash, are you gonna be happy with me if you find out later that you could have kept 10K in your pocket and paid 60 extra months a month? I don't think so. And that's what I'm here to show you. And sometimes people don't like that because they think that I'm trying to like one-up them or show them, like trying to make them pay full price, and that's not it at all. That is not it at all. It is the full picture of what's reasonable. Like I said, I'm going to do a comparable market analysis on a property that you like to say this is the reasonable range, right? It gives you price ranges. So if it's falling within that price range, then we're probably within reason, and then you get to decide whether you accept that or not, right? It's not up for me to accept that, it's up for you to. But ultimately, there are different ways to go about accomplishing your goals. And I know it is so hard when you've read all the investor books and you've gotten all this information about how you gotta waggle a deal. And there are different times and seasons for that and different phases of the market and also different loan products. With a VA loan, that is not the time that you're typically waggling a deal unless you have cash. Because remember, cash is king. So let's talk about that. Well, we have all these people that bought when the rates were crazy low. Now they're happy to sell and pass along that loan, let you assume their VA loan, but you have to pay the cash difference. So if somebody paid $250,000 for a house six years ago, and now they owe $200,000, right? That's what they owe. Now the house is worth more than $250,000 now, especially if they bought it pre prior to COVID. So let's just say this house is $325 now. That's probably easy numbers, like on the lower side still. So this house is now $325. So they owe $200. Do you have $125,000 to make up that gap? Probably not. But if you do, if you sold a property or you have an inheritance or you've been really good at saving and you have a lump sum like that, then you 100% could probably get a really decent deal on a house where you're getting to assume a loan, have instant equity in it, and have a very low payment because of that. So that is absolutely something that exists out there. Now it also takes a little bit more patience. It's not a quick 30 to 45 day closing situation. There's a little bit more red tape involved, but that's an option. So if you fall in that bucket, then by all means, give me a call and let's go shopping. But if you are like most normal people that are in the market buying, and you do not have $50,000, $75,000, $100,000 in cash laying around, then we need to put our creative hats on and do what we can accomplish with what we have. And one of the things that I'm finding is out of my four folks that I'm working with, one of them, one, is willing to house hack. And what do I mean by that? I mean having roommates that are paying you. Okay. And that is where the gold is, right? Like we're getting so stuck on the numbers right in front of our face instead of finding the solution. It is hard right now to justify purchasing a house because the rental rates in my immediate area are lower overall than the mortgage rates. Okay. However, we can beat that. And I actually have a really cool little report and tool that I have done for the area around Fort Bright. So if you are considering starting your investment portfolio or want to buy your house and want to make sure you could rent it out in the future, then we need to connect because it's really neat. What I've done is I've looked at the past rentals in the past 180 days and the three counties surrounding the base. And any of In neighborhoods that had five or more properties leased in the past 180 days. So it's a pretty tight time frame. I isolated them. So there are 17 neighborhoods that I can show you five or more properties have rented within that 180-day timeframe. And then I've got their rental rates range for that neighborhood. So then we backtracked, and then we're able to go back and look at properties that are for sale in those 17 specific neighborhoods and start to see where we can find a sweet spot for the price point. And then we take that and put it in this amortization spreadsheet and we say, okay, if my mortgage is $1750 and I need it to be down to $1,600, I have three to five years to do that. How much extra do I need to pay on my mortgage every month to do that? And I can play with that. I have a spot where I can put in the extra payments and it's going to show me how much it drops. And we can go down and look at the three-year mark or the five-year mark and see where the payment lies. And so we know whether we're doing okay or not. So the point whenever we're renting it out is not necessarily to cash flow from the get-go. If you can, that's amazing. But given that we are buying a house with a VA loan, we're probably rolling in a funding fee, we're going to be living in it, then that changes the scenario a little bit. It's not a true investment when we're walking in the door with equity in it and a lower payment because we put a down payment where it should be cash flowing, right? If we're breaking even, we're doing great. And I would even beg to tell you that even if you had to pay a little bit for a little while, it's still better than turning around and selling it at a loss or not making any money on it because you will make that money back in the future. So that is where I love to show what we can do and how we can accomplish it, what you need in the long term. Now, house hacking is amazing. Okay. So if you have a buddy that's coming into the base and would rent it, let's say your mortgage, one of my folks wants to be at $2,000 or less. Okay. So he's willing to pay $2,000 or less on his own. So up to $2,000 on his own. What if you had a roommate that was paying $800 a month plus utilities? Now you're already willing to pay $2,000 a month. So take half of that, take $400 and put it to your principal balance, additional payment, and then take $400 and stick it in your pocket or pay that your half of the utilities with it. And then have a little bit to chew on, right? Or the other $400 goes towards the mortgage. And then that means you're only paying $1,600, not $2,000. But you have a way now to get like really ahead on the mortgage super freaking fast, just because you have a buddy paying you $800 a month to stay there. Now, buddies not getting an apartment for $800 a month. That ain't happening. So that's a really good deal for your buddy, and it's a really good deal for you. And it tracks with your goals. So why wouldn't you do that? And it doesn't even matter. I've seen so many posts where people are like, hey, I'm coming in for a training. I'm gonna be there for six months. I just need a room to rent. I'm not getting rid of my house where I'm at, my family's staying behind, whatever have you. Bro, let's go! And I would tell you like, if we were still newlyweds, like without kids, and that was the case, like we would even do that, even as a married couple. I actually was showing houses to a family this weekend or a couple this weekend, and they were telling me they had a friend live with them for about a year and it worked out really well for them. There's nothing wrong with that. There's just not. And nowadays, there's so many different configurations of houses, and a lot of times it's like a split floor plan. Dude, so easy. So easy. So I would highly encourage you to think about all these different ways that you can accomplish your goals and don't get stuck on the right now. The right now might look really crappy when you're looking at the numbers and feel like, why would I even do this? You are doing it for the future. You were doing it for the five, 10, 15 years down the road before when you retire or when you get out of the military. You're doing it for that security, for the ability to have options in the future, to have liquid cash in the future that you don't even know exists right now because it's just sitting in a house, right? It is an amazing savings plan and it is an amazing tool to build a foundation for your future and to have options. Bar none, even if in five years you decide to get out of the military and you just need somewhere to put your head down while you're getting your act together and figuring out what your next step is. You've got it. You've got it. So don't let the short-term scariness right now dissuade you from what you can accomplish in the future. And you've got to look at the full picture. You've got to look at the full picture. And by golly, you gotta listen to your trusted professional. I know there's all the books out there. I know there's all the cool people that have done all these cool things. But I will tell you, I love following my the one guy that was a Marine and it's military to millionaire. And he did it by house hacking. He didn't just do it by waggling a deal and doing lowball offers with the VA loan. He did it because he house hacked and then he was able to take equity and but continue to move it and roll it where he needed to. So he didn't do it like some crazy easy way. He put his money where his mouth was and he opened his doors and had extra income coming in. That's the way to go, my friend. And also the conversation about being able to buy multi-units isn't amazing. It's hard to come by. It's very hard to find a lot of residential up to four, so like a duplex or a triplex that are being sold together, not as two separate addresses or whatever have you, that are VA eligible and within a reasonable price point. That's just not that prevalent, at least in my areas. So if you're able to snag that, then that is amazing. You can buy up to a quad, so four doors with your VA loan, as long as you are living in one of them. So if you won't mind sharing walls with someone, that is an amazing way to have your mortgage completely paid for, is to buy a multi-unit and be able to live in one of them and rent out the rest. So that is an awesome conversation to have as well. But that is what he did. I think it's David Pereira. I will find it and I will tag him in the show notes as well. But that's what he did is he had multi-units and he househacked. So it wasn't, I got low ball offers on these wonderful, beautiful houses. Like that's not how that happened. So, anyhow, you got to listen to the people that have actually done it your way, how you want to accomplish it. And if you want to accomplish it with a VA loan, you've got some parameters you have to work with. And we don't get away from that. Period. End of discussion. So listen to your trusted advisors and let us guide you and have a good scenario for the whole picture. The whole picture. So, with that said, I will tell you there are plenty of reasonable properties under $250,000 in the Fayetteville metro area. Did you hear that? There are plenty of VA eligible properties under $250,000 right now in the Fayetteville and surrounding areas. I have shown them. I am looking at them. I showed 12 of them yesterday. It's possible, my friends. It is very, very, very possible. Now, you probably are not finding properties that are $150,000, $175,000 that are VA eligible right now. But if you can get to like that $200 mark and be between 200 and 250 all day long, we can find you something. We can play ball. Now, the other thing is that if you're building a portfolio, you do have to keep location in mind. And that's the other thing that's been lost in my conversations with these folks is they say one thing, right? And the action is different. They say, I don't want to be in X or I want to be in this type of area. And then they pull up these properties that are like not there. They're in very different areas, they're in very different conditions, and they just think that they're gonna get a good deal on it. That's that's not what you told me you wanted to accomplish. You said that you wanted to be in a family-friendly residential area that it's actually going to rent in the future. So if that's your ultimate goal, that costs something and it's worth something. I had, oh my goodness. How do I say this? So somebody was talking about we get so focused on the cost of things that we forget the worth of it. And that's like with everything in life. We get so worried about how much, oh, it's Ed Milette. It was an Ed Milette podcast. He was talking about how you go to a store and when you don't have money, all of our decisions are based on how much it costs. I'm going to buy this jacket because it costs X amount and I can afford it, right? Instead of what it, what is it worth? What is it worth to me? What do I desire? What has value to me? I might not like that jacket. I'm buying it because I can afford it right now and it's gonna keep me warm. But in the future, I'm gonna go buy the jacket that I like and not look at the price tag because it's worth it to me, because it's going to do what I want it to accomplish. Okay, same thing. You can't be so concerned about what the cost is right now. What is it worth to you in the future? What is your goal? Because the cost and the goal have to match, right? Like if it's not worth it, if it's not worth it to equal your goal, then we're not accomplishing anything. So that's definitely like a really hard mindset shift for me personally. I'm one of those people that has always felt like, I wish money didn't rule the world, but it does. Let's that's a hard habit to break, to not be focused on the cost of everything. But we have our parameters, right? We have our bumper guards on for what our price point is that we're comfortable with, the payment we're comfortable with. And then at that point, we need to work with that and be willing to pay that because it's worth it. If it's not worth it, I'll be the first to tell you. I'll tell you, I can't match these numbers. I don't see the value here. And I've done that before. And I've told my clients, listen, if you're willing to pay for it at this price, that's totally fine. But I can't tell you an appraiser is going to come in here and give that value. And the thing you need to understand is when that happens, then anything we've negotiated might change. If the appraisal does not come in where we need it to be, then all of these extras that you've got included right now, they might be out the window. Seller may not be willing to do those if they're at a different price point. So it's always a conversation to be had. But that is why I care so much about trying to prove the worth, the value of the property before we write an offer, because I don't want us to have surprises on the back end. Is it still going to happen every once in a while? Yeah, I can't control the appraisal. I just can't. But I can show numbers all day long. I can see what's tracking. I can show you whether I actually have really close comps or not. And I'll tell you that. I'll say there's nothing very close to this property that has sold in the last six months. To me, that that makes it a little bit harder to find a very short, tight-knit value. Okay. So I'm very upfront about that. We will talk about all the differences of what I'm seeing whenever we look at the numbers. But all that to say, just know there is an amazing opportunity for you to build a portfolio with your VA loan while you were in the military. And yes, just a reminder, you can use your VA loan more than once. And you can have two VA loans at the same time. It just depends on how much eligibility is left. And if you can purchase a house with that amount of eligibility, or if you have extra cash to match and bring to the table so that you use the loan eligibility amount for this much and then bring the remainder. So you can 100% have more than one VA loan at a time if you are moving to the next duty station. In my experience, once you get to the third, is where it gets sticky. There's usually not enough eligibility left. But we've got ways around that. We've got tools and ways to think about, okay, now's the time that I'm going to refinance my first property and put it into a different loan product, or maybe go ahead and put it into an LLC and then move forward from there. So there's all different ways to go about this to make sure that we continue to be able to use this benefit that has been granted to us for being a part of the military. And I say us as in like my family, because obviously I'm not the military member. I'm very thankful for my husband who is. So, anyhow, I just want you to know that there's a way to do it tactfully and that I am so game to help you get there, but we have to honor the guardrails that are in place for us, right? We're not going to get away from that. And we don't have control over that. So, what we do have control over is knowing what those are, what the things are that we need to look for, and honoring whether they exist or not, right? That's what we can control. And I even said to a client today, like, we were talking about ordering an appraisal and we need to negotiate some repairs. And I said, okay, well, they're they're like, when's the appraisal going to be ordered? And it's like, the the lender's waiting on me to give them the green light after our inspections. I said, so if the seller says no, I will not do anything else to this house at this point forward, will you still purchase it? And they were like, no, they need to do a couple of things for me. And it's all that feeling of like give and take, right? They just need to feel like they're getting a little something and that the seller's being reasonable and helping them out, which is fine. And so then the case is we're not ordering the appraisal until we get that answer back, right? So it's the same thing here. Like if we have a concern about whether it would be VA eligible or not, then we'd be really wise to go ahead and ask for those items up front before an appraisal is ever ordered to know will the seller actually acknowledge and fix these things or not? Because if they're not willing to fix it now, what's the chance that they're gonna be willing to fix it once we actually have an appraisal in? And then now you've wasted $450 to $900, depending on how much your appraisal costs, and we have to start all over again. You don't get that money back just because the seller doesn't want to do a repair. So that's where, like, I am truly trying to protect you and make sure that you have guidance to get a really good deal and also not spend an exorbitant amount on inspections and appraisals because we have to keep restarting because a property wasn't eligible or the seller won't do something that we need them to do. There's there is a whole picture to look at with all of that. And you would not be happy if we get three properties in where you've had to pay $350 to $550 for an inspection. And like I said, anywhere from $450 to $900 for an appraisal on every individual house. That literally is your closing cost that you're asking for already before you've ever made it to the closing table. So we want to be very certain and sure that we can get it from point A to point Z, which is the closing table confidently. And that's what I'm here to do. That is my job is to negotiate the deal, but also to create confidence in the scenario that we can do exactly what you want to do. So please, please, please lean into your trusted advisors. We truly want you to meet your goals and we want you to have the future wealth and stability and opportunities that you can have by building a portfolio while you are in the military. So if this interests you or you would like to have a conversation, please reach out. If you think this would be valuable for somebody else you know or someone else you've had a conversation about, whether it's house hacking or buying VA houses to build a portfolio, please like and share it along to them. This is something I'm super passionate about, and I absolutely love having the conversations and being a part of the story. So I hope you have a wonderful day. Thanks for hanging out with me, and I cannot wait to tell you about my next deal. Hey! I just wanted to say thank you for being here and listening in on this episode of Closing Chapters with me. I truly enjoy putting this content together, and I hope that you enjoy it too. If so, could you like, subscribe, and share this episode with somebody you know that will enjoy it just as much as you did? Thank you so much.