If you’ve ever shopped for a loan or mortgage, you know how much of a difference your credit score can make. Higher scores can help qualify you for better terms, lower interest rates and special funding only offered to low-risk borrowers. However, nobody’s credit is perfect, and bad credit can take a long time to improve. If you’re interested in flipping houses but have bad credit, there are plenty of funding options available to help get you started.
Here are the best ways to get funding to flip regardless of your credit score:
If you have bad credit, a private lender might be a good option for funding a flip. The major reason to consider a private loan is that they come from sources who don’t follow the same rules and criteria as traditional financial institutions. Therefore, they might not weigh a credit score as heavily—some may not require a check at all. Because every private lender is different, it’s crucial to research the options carefully, so make sure you can still work within their custom requirements.
You can borrow against the equity of your current home to fund a new purchase. This includes cash-out refinancing, home equity lines of credit and home equity loans. The first option means you would refinance your current mortgage and keep the difference between the loans as cash. Home equity lines of credit work like credit cards to offer you money up front that’s borrowed against home equity. Home equity loans are like traditional mortgages, but use your property as collateral.
Crowdfunding is an excellent way to gather financing for a project from multiple sources, none of which require a high credit score. By using one of the major online crowdfunding platforms, you can set up a fund for your fix-and-flip purchase through contributions from people all over the world. Crowdfunding is the most flexible option but also requires some marketing savvy to be successful. If you’re willing to put in the work, this is an excellent option for financing your project regardless of credit.
While your credit score matters in many financial situations, there are ways to achieve your goals without a high score. No matter what kind of credit you have, these three options are great to consider for funding your flip.
Dating back to the 1970s when his father put him in charge of the family real estate business, Jeffrey Germagian has built a longstanding portfolio of real estate transactions and developments. Along the way, he has grown the family’s original company, then known as Baystate Realty, to the elite status it represents today as ERA Key Realty Services.
Although we’ve expanded our real estate offerings and our branding has evolved to represent all of the real estate services that we provide, ERA Key Realty, The Baystate Group still holds true to the honest business practices and principles that Jeffrey’s father set out with decades ago.
Jeffrey manages the Baystate Group which specializes in traditional home resales, land development, and 55 communities.
He lives in Hopedale, MA, and serves the local towns in the area including most suburbs of Boston as well as southwest of Boston. He is a Certified Residential Specialist and is fully licensed as a real estate agent to practice throughout the entire state of Massachusetts.