want to refinance FHA loan, may move out unexpectedly and would like to keep as investment property, what are my options?
Most likely no.  Just make sure to read the fine print.  I'm in exactly the same boat, I have a house with an FHA loan and will be refinancing to conventional then using it as an investment.  To refinance, you usually have to own 25% of your property before you can refinance, or buy another property with FHA financing. If you are planning on refinancing with FHA, then things might not work.  The only way around this is if you move like you said you might.  Take a look at this article section (A) for Relocations, good stuff: http://portal.hud.gov/FHAFAQ/controllerServlet?method=showPopup&faqId=1-6KT-879 Streamline refinance is the way to go.  You don't have to stay with the same bank to do so either.  The big advantage of the streamline is the original appraisal is used for the refinance, so as long as you didn't have negative amortization(impossible in FHA anyways), you're good to go.  It will be much less paperwork and looser credit standards.  The ONLY downside is that upfront and monthly FHA mortgage insurance ticked up from where it was 2 years ago.  If you're under a 80% LTV however you won't have to worry about it.
I'm not sure about your first two options.  But given your situation, a variant of option three seems possible.   That way you don't have to throw away your appraisal, although it's possible that you'll need to get some kind of addendum related to the repairs.   You also don't have your liquid money tied up long term.  You just need to float it for a month or two while the repairs are being done.  The bank should be able to preapprove you for the loan.   Note that you might be better off without the loan.  You'll have to pay interest on the loan and there's extra red tape.   I'd just prefer not to tie up so much money in this property.   I don't understand this.  With a loan, you are even more tied up.  Anything you do, you have to work with the bank.  Sure, you have $80k more cash available with the loan, but it doesn't sound like you need it.  With the loan, the bank makes the profit.  If you buy in cash, you lose your interest from the cash, but you save paying the interest on the loan.  In general, the interest rate on the loan will be higher than the return on the cash equivalent.   A fourth option would be to pay the $15k up front as earnest money.  The seller does the repairs through your chosen contractor.  You pay the remaining $12.5k for the downpayment and buy the house with the loan.  This is a more complicated purchase contract though, so cash might be a better option.   You can easily evaluate the difficulty of the second option.  Call a different bank and ask.  If you explain the situation, they'll let you know if they can use the existing appraisal or not.  Also consider asking the appraiser if there are specific banks that will accept the appraisal.  That might be quicker than randomly choosing banks.   It may be that your current bank just isn't used to investment properties.  Requiring the previous owner to do repairs prior to sale is very common in residential properties.  It sounds like the loan officer is trying to use the rules for residential for your investment purchase.  A different bank may be more inclined to work with you for your actual purchase. If you intend to flip this property, you might consider either a construction loan or private money. A construction loan allows you to borrow from a bank against the value of the finished house a little at a time. As each stage of the construction/repairs are completed, the bank releases more funds to you. Interest accrues during the construction, but no payments need to be made until the construction/repairs are complete.  Private money works in a similar manner, but the full amount can be released to you at once so you can get the repairs done more quickly. The interest rate will be higher. If you are flipping, then this higher interest rate is simply a cost of doing business. Since it's a private loan, you ca structure the deal any way you want. Perhaps accruing interest until the property is sold and then paying it back as a single balloon payment on sale of the property. To find private money, contact a mortgage broker and tell them what you have in mind.  If you're intending to keep the property for yourself, private money is still an option. Once the repairs are complete, have the bank reassess the property value and refinance based on the new amount. Pay back the private loan with equity pulled from the house and all the shiny new repairs. Some options: See if the seller will sell to you on Contract.  With a significant down payment the seller may be willing to sell you the condo on contract.  This fill in the year or so you will probably need to go from contractor to full time employee with enough time on the job to get a mortgage.   Keep Shopping.  Be up front with the lenders with the problems you are running into and see if any of them can find you a solution.  You may need to take a higher rate in the short term but hopefully you can refinance in a few years to a more reasonable rate. Check with a local bank or credit union.  Many times local banks or CU's will finance high demand properties that may be out of favor with the super banks that have no ties to your community.  These banks sometimes realize that just because the standard spreadsheet says this is a bad risk the reality is the specific property you are interested in is not the risk that it appears on paper.  You will have to find a bank that actually retains its mortgages as many local banks have become agents that just sell mortgages to the mortgage market. Talk to a Realtor.  If you are not using one now it may be time to engage one.  They can help you navigate these bumps and steer you towards lenders that are more amenable to the loan you need. "Some of the other answers recommended peer-to-peer lending and property markets. I would not invest in either of these. Firstly, peer-to-peer lending is not a traditional investment and we may not have enough historical data for the risk-to-return ratio. Secondly, property investments have a great risk unless you diversify, which requires a huge portfolio. Crowd-funding for one property is not a traditional investment, and may have drawbacks. For example, what if you disagree with other crowd-funders about the required repairs for the property? If you invest in the property market, I recommend a well-diversified fund that owns many properties. Beware of high debt leverage used to enhance returns (and, at the same time, risk) and high fees when selecting a fund. However, traditionally it has been a better choice to invest in stocks than to invest in property market. Beware of anyone who says that the property market is ""too good to not get into"" without specifying which part of the world is meant. Note also that many companies invest in properties, so if you invest only in a well-diversified stock index fund, you may already have property investments in your portfolio! However, in your case I would keep the money in risk-free assets, i.e. bank savings or a genuine low-cost money market fund (i.e. one that doesn't invest in corporate debt or in variable-rate loans which have short duration but long maturity). The reason is that you're going to be unemployed soon, and thus, you may need the money soon. If you have an investment horizon of, say, 10 years, then I would throw stocks into the mix, and if you're saving for retirement, then I would go all in to stocks. In the part of the world where I live in, money market funds generally have better return than bank savings, and better diversification too. However, your 2.8% interest sounds rather high (the money market fund I have in the past invested in currently yields at 0.02%, but then again I live in the eurozone), so be sure to get estimates for the yields of different risk-free assets. So, my advice for investing is simple: risk-free assets for short time horizon, a mixture of stocks and risk-free assets for medium time horizon, and only stocks for long time horizon. In any case, you need a small emergency fund, too, which you should consider a thing separate from your investments. My emergency fund is 20 000 EUR. Your 50 000 AUD is bit more than 30 000 EUR, so you don't really have that much money to invest, only a bit more than a reasonably sized emergency fund. But then again, I live in rental property, so my expenses are probably higher than yours. If you can foresee a very long time horizon for part of your investment, you could perhaps invest 50% of your money to stocks (preference being a geographically diversified index fund or a number of index funds), but I wouldn't invest more because of the need for an emergency fund." "So you're making $150,000 per year and you have $245,000 in debts. You're in your late 30s and have $41,000, or less than 1/3 of a year's pay, put away for retirement. That's a bad situation, but not disastrous. Lots of people have recovered from far worse. But like the old joke goes, when you realize that you're deep in a hole, STOP DIGGING. The worst thing you could do right now is liquidate the few assets you have and go deeper into debt. I don't know where you live or what the housing market is there. But the easy answer is: find a cheaper house.  I'm not sure what you mean about ""affect the resale value"". Yes, if you buy a cheaper house it will have a lower resale value. So what? The days when a house was an investment that would skyrocket in value are over. (And even in those days, it didn't help most people. So when you move, you get a big profit on the sale of your house. But the house you're moving to probably went up by a similar percentage, so you really didn't gain anything.) Even if your house did increase in value, unless you sell it, that doesn't help you make the mortgage payments. It's a paper profit. Get yourself out of debt. Step 1 is to stop taking on new debts. And if at all possible, you should be putting bare minimum 6% into your retirement plan. I don't know where you work, but most employers match some percentage of the first 6% you put in. If you don't take advantage of that, you're giving up free money." With student loans at 2%, I wouldn't pay a dime over minimum on that, and I certainly wouldn't sell an investment property to pay them off, you can get CD's that beat 2% interest. With the rentals, you could sell the one that isn't performing as well and pay no capital gains tax if you lived in it 2 of the last 5 years (counting 5 years back from sale date). That'd be a nice chunk of money for your down-payment. The risk of using proceeds to buy a different rental property is that you may find you don't like being a distance landlord, and then you'd lose money selling or be stuck doing something you don't enjoy for a while until you can sell without a loss. Like you mentioned, the risk of selling either/both rental properties is that if the Arizona housing/rental markets do well you'd have given up your position and missed out. Ultimately, I think it's about your desired timeline, if you are content to wait a while to buy in San Diego, you could have a handsome down payment, will know whether or not you like being a distance landlord, and can sell/keep the rentals accordingly. Alternatively, if you want to get a house in San Diego sooner, then selling one or both rentals gets you there faster. If I was in your position, I'd probably sell the rental that I lived in and put that toward a down-payment on a primary residence, keeping the other rental for now and trying my hand at being a distance landlord. To protect yourself from an increase in interest rates get a fixed rate loan. The loan terms: interest rate, number of payments, monthly payments will be fixed for the loan. Of course if rate for the rest of the market drops during the period of the loan, you may be able to refinance the loan. But if you can't refinance, or won't refinance, the drop in rates for the rest of the market doesn't help you. If you want to be able to have your rate float you can get a variable rate loan. Of course it can float up, or it can float down. So you take that risk. Because of that risk adjustable rate loans start at a lower rate. If the market interest rate drops far enough many people will refinance into a fixed rate loan at a lower rate than they could have gotten at the start. For adjustable rate loans the lender, during the application process, details how the rate is determined. It is pegged to be x% above some national or international interest rate that they don't have any control over. If that base rate moves then your loan rate may move. They also specify how often it will adjust, and the maximum it can adjust between each adjustments and over the entire life of the loan.  That rate that starts initially lower than the fixed rate loan is the enticement that many people have to pick an adjustable rate loan. Some do it because they believe they will payoff the loan before the rates get too high, or they will see enough increase in income so they can afford the higher monthly payment if rates rise. If they are wrong about these things they may find themselves in trouble. The terms of the adjustable rate loan still have to follow the terms of the contract: the lender can't change the % offset or the source used to used to set interest rate. "Another option would be to not refinance but also not pay any extra each month but to continue as you are making the existing payments and just put the ""extra"" you would have paid aside in an investment of some type (something you are comfortable with)  This as the added benefit of not tying up this extra money in your house should you need it in the next few years for something else. You would then have the option in 2 or 3 years of continuing on this path or closing the investment and paying off the remaining principal in one lump sum.   If nothing else that big payment would be a really fun check to write."