By Dr. Jim Dahle, WCI FounderI received an email from a WCIer who is doing great financially but, like most of us, has a rich-person problem to solve. The details are obscured enough to protect the innocent.
“I was hoping to get your thoughts on the best way to do a new home purchase in regard to funding the remaining down payment without selling our current home right away. My spouse and I are looking to upsize our home in the near future. We have a young but growing family. In order to make moving as easy as possible, we would like to first buy our new home, then move in, then list/sell our current home.
We live in the South, and [we] are looking for a home in the range of $2.6 million-$3.2 million. Our current home is valued between $1.1 million-$1.3 million. We owe $520,000 on our current mortgage (3.4% interest rate).
Our household income is $680,000 per year (my spouse stays at home with multiple children). We have no consumer debt, a fully funded emergency fund, and our only debt is the mortgage. We've started 529s and have mid six figures in retirement accounts and low seven figures in a taxable account.
After saving on the side for a couple of years, we have just over $500,000 in a money market fund for our down payment.
If we end up buying a $3.2 million home and need $660,000 for a down payment, how would you recommend funding the remaining ~$150,000?
Obviously, I could sell taxable investments but would have to account for capital gains. But is a margin loan or a bridge loan also something to look into? How do I figure out which would be better as far as fees and interest rates for those vs. the capital gains?
When we sell our current house later, I do plan to pay off any loan or re-invest any sold investments with the equity from that sale. Also planning to put most, if not all, the remaining equity toward the new home mortgage principal. I realize this is a super [rich-person] problem and we will be fine either way but would like to go through the thought experiment anyway.”
A Safe Place to Ask Questions
For most of us, there are few places in our lives where we can openly discuss money. As you can imagine, this WCIer probably isn't going to talk about this at work, with neighbors, or with family members. It is important to us here at WCI to provide a community where these issues can be discussed. Yes, they're rich-person problems, but they are still problems that need to be solved. In this case, there are a lot of options. I can think of seven. Let's go through them.
#1 Contingencies
In most “normal” real estate markets, this sort of issue is simply solved with a contingency in the purchase contract. All that means is that, “I'll buy your house, but not until mine sells.” These are actually pretty normal to see in purchase contracts, and most sellers getting a good price on their house will accept them and just be patient. They know you want to move to the new home and that you are working hard to sell the old one. Frankly, the old one is way easier to sell than the new one, given its much lower price.
However, in the real estate markets we've seen in the last few years, where there are multiple offers for more than the asking price, a contingency like this is going to spell doom for your offer. You really have to analyze where you are in the market. For these WCIers, the average cost of a home in their community is under $400,000. There is not a huge market for homes of $3 million-plus. They're not competing with a lot of other people, so the contingency may work fine.
More information here:
How to Buy a House the Right Way
#2 Sell First
Another approach is to just get your home on the market and get it sold. Most sellers are very happy to move quickly. So, you get your home under contract and go find a new home and put a contingency offer in place, but note that your home is already under contract. It's much more attractive to the seller. If you are OK living somewhere else for a month or two, selling first can also work well. But most of us aren't too excited about going to live with family, using a short-term rental, or going to a hotel. Moving twice just kind of stinks.
#3 Use a Doctor Loan
We've been advertising doctor mortgage lenders here at WCI for many years. Most of these loans require relatively tiny down payments (0%-5%), don't charge PMI, and often don't have significantly higher fees or interest rates. Theoretically, one could get a doctor loan for the new home and then refinance it when the equity comes in from the old loan. Finding a $3 million-plus jumbo doctor loan might be a little more challenging, but it's probably worth a try. Obviously, when you're going to have two loans at once, it's a little harder to qualify for that second one.
More information here:
Physician vs. Conventional Loan
Are Physician Mortgage Loans a Good Idea?
#4 Use a Bridge Loan
This situation is screaming for a bridge loan, which is basically a relatively short-term loan with relatively low fees that you only keep for a few months. This allows you to borrow out your home equity in the old home and use it for a down payment on the new home. This is what we did in 2010 when we bought our current home. We got burned on it because we didn't end up selling that old home until 2015. It was OK in our case. The bridge loan was about the same interest rate as we already had; it just happened to be a 20-year fixed loan, so the payments were a little higher.
#5 401(k) Loans
I'm not a huge fan of 401(k) loans, but they're better than they used to be. Now, you get a little more time to pay them back if you get fired. I still think they can be safely used short-term by wealthy people for purposes like this. The main problem with them is that you can only get a maximum loan of $50,000 or half the 401(k) value, whichever is less. Unless these WCIers have multiple 401(k)s offering loans, this isn't going to solve their problem completely.
#6 Margin Loans
With a seven-figure portfolio and most of a down payment in cash already, these WCIers don't actually need much more money, relatively speaking. A $150,000 margin loan on a seven-figure portfolio is awfully safe from margin calls. Interest rates aren't awesome, though. In late April 2025, these were the interest rates available on a $150,000 loan:
- Vanguard 11.25%
- Fidelity 11.075%
- Schwab 11.075%
- Interactive Brokers 5.68%-8.68%
Obviously, one of these things is not like the others, but most of us don't already have an account at Interactive Brokers. These WCIers would need to transfer some assets to Interactive Brokers before borrowing this money.
#7 Sell Assets
Selling assets is also an option. Sometimes it is a great option if you have legacy investments like individual stocks that you'd like to get rid of anyway. The main downside is the capital gains taxes, especially if you're in a situation where you have short-term capital gains. These WCIers probably aren't, and maybe they've been tax-loss harvesting and have a bunch of losses that can cover up the gains without a tax bill. Also note that if you only need $150,000, you could possibly get that with only a $10,000-$20,000 long-term gain by selling only high-basis shares. The tax bill on that isn't too bad, but it's still probably higher than just paying interest for a few months.
More information here:
The 7 Worst Ways to Invest in Real Estate
Comparing Options
Mathematically, if you want to compare options, you'll need to do some figuring using fourth grade math. Calculate the tax bill by writing down the basis of all the taxable assets, figure out if they'll be long-term or short-term capital gains, and subtract any capital losses you've got. You can then compare that cost to the loan fees and a few months of interest that you'll pay on a bridge or margin loan. It's a little imprecise when you don't know how many months of interest you'll pay, so estimate carefully.
Thoughts on Mortgages
I'm not a huge fan of debt or high mortgages. We paid off the 15-year mortgage on our place in seven years and then cash flowed our huge renovation a few years later. But having a reasonable mortgage is hardly a huge financial problem for most WCIers, especially when interest rates are low. And if you have a mortgage for 15-30 years, you'll probably go through a period of time with low interest rates when you can refinance. Nevertheless, I think it's worth considering a few guidelines on how much of a mortgage is OK. I typically use two guidelines.
The first is that you should not have a mortgage of more than 2X your gross income. If this couple has a gross income of $680,000 and wants to buy a $3.2 million house, that would suggest a down payment of $1.84 million. That's going to require all of their home equity and all of their cash, plus most of their taxable account. Basically, their home has become a massive piece of their financial life. I'm not sure I'd recommend that. Can it work out? Absolutely. Will it work out? Probably, but it's nowhere near guaranteed. In a town with an average home price of $400,000, is a $3 million house really so much better than a $1 million house that it's worth taking on this much risk and delaying retirement so many years? Only they can decide.
The second rule is to keep your housing costs to less than 20% of your gross income. That includes the mortgage, property taxes, insurance, and utilities. At our now more moderate interest rates, it doesn't take too big of a mortgage to violate that rule, but 20% of $680,000 is still a six-figure amount: $136,000. Allowing some money for taxes, insurance, and utilities on an $8,000-per-month, 6.5%, 30-year mortgage totals $1.25 million, quite a bit less than what this couple is talking about borrowing by only putting down 20%.
If they must have this house now, maybe they ought to liquidate a lot more of that taxable account to do so, even with a significant capital gains cost.
The more wealth you have and resources that are available to you, the more options you have to solve your financial problems. Choose wisely between them.
Have more questions about physician mortgages and if they're the best option for you? Let us introduce you to the best doctor mortgage lenders in the business, vetted by WCI and thousands of readers.
What do you think? Would you buy this house now? Why or why not? Which option would you choose to solve it?
I’ve purchased two homes for nothing down by pledging mutual fund shares as collateral. I found that most banks will accept a loan-to-book of 50%. In this example, pledging $300K in collateral will meet the $150K requirement. The banks released the collateral when no longer needed to conform to the 80% loan-to-book. No tax implications. I recommend spreading the collateral across several funds so that you can TLH if required. Only the taxable account was eligible.
Just me, but our incomes have been well north of this couple’s for the last 20 years, and we would consider a $3M home to be unaffordable. A $3M home comes with related expenses, some obvious and some intangible, which push the family into a $3M lifestyle.
The reader is trying to bite more than they can chew, to put it bluntly. $3.2M house with a NW of low 7 figures is way too much. It’s at least equal of what they have in post tax funds. This is a classic case of being house poor. They make a great income but I’m sure it’s a stressful job already, in terms of time and skill they need to put in. The stress will multiply with a big chunk of their take home pay going into mortgage. We are talking about early career burnout, retirement pushed by several years, risk of overworking affecting physical and mental health, marital problems, to name a few.
Agree. Don’t know where they live or why they feel the need to upsize- I guess the several children is the key, want more rooms? But if they are feeling the need to live larger they really need to consider career longevity. If that large income drops (better have disability and life insurance already!) will they still be able to cover the mortgage and expenses of such a home? Does this move mean if he dies his kids and wife will need to move from their home and try to sell a $3M elephant or the bank gets it?
At lower levels- military FP docs- we saw colleagues live large while we decided (with double their income much of the time- two docs) we might want to retire or one of us stay home with kids or maybe medicine would be socialized and we’d be better off (same pay, less hours) becoming teachers. So we always got homes about half the cost of what realtors wanted to sell us. Oh well I guess it’s good for the supply of docs in the country that most of our colleagues are still working in their 60s while we opted to retire in our 40s/ 50s.
Is liquidating the 529s an option? If there are little to no gains there would be little to no tax and penalties, correct? Plenty of time to refill those accounts.
Not a bad option. Might have to give back some state tax breaks, but that’s state dependent.
1- I bet the $3M home will be on the market for a while- would the seller accept move in rental prior to completion of sale/ mortgage? Just for those few months to avoid two moves, worse re furniture than people.
2- oddly enough Bank of Mom (or Oma almost in this case) is solving this problem for my daughter at a much lower level. MIL passing meant I (we) gave both kids a chunk more than adequate for a down payment in our area- husband will file a gift tax return this year since Oma didn’t give it to them directly. They are carrying her old mortgage (owned it before meeting her partner) whereas SIL got the new mortgage with first time homebuyer (which legally he is) discounts and are able to cover both without further money from us except for the reno work once proceeding. They plan an extended double ‘occupancy’ while bringing the new place- bought more for the lot size than the home- up to what they want from its 60 yo roots and size. I’ve offered them a loan at better than CD rates for us, better than mortgage rates for them. Until they move- this year might be optimistic with the rebuild involved- the loan will be for the reno once that starts. I offered the loan being paid off yearly with annual gifting limits from us- double the amount once sister has a partner and we give each kid’s family 4 x the annual limit- but they want to have an entire 30 year mortgage with us and prefer getting the annual gift separate from monthly payments to us.
Had to advise that since we need to be able to give her sister the same cash inflow someday unclear if we can fully support that, and the annual gifting might end if our needs increase! So we plan a long term, part of what she will likely inherit ‘mortgage’ (no lien on hte place though) and a smaller bridge loan they will repay when they sell the old house. (Formal) loan documents will be part of our estate planning- ie her 50% when we’re both gone will include the loan so her sister gets a fair share, or if we are impoverished in old age Medicaid will have paperwork to sue her for our support!
Too bad? for this couple they are the MD generation not the MD’s kids generation, but hey they ought to factor in, will they have any money to help their several kids buy a house with such a huge house expense? I foresee a big drop in lifestyle for at least some of their kids once they move out, and all of them if that socialized medicine I once feared ever comes to pass.
Does a HELOC count as a bridge loan? I did this 10 years ago… Opened a HELOC on house#1 a few months before starting serious house hunting (and didn’t mention the plan to the bank), used the HELOC primarily for the down payment on the new house, closed with a new primary mortgage on house #2, then did a bunch of work on the new house before actually moving in, then listed and sold house #1. In doing paid off primary mortgage and HELOC on house #1. We then wrote a giant check to the lender for the mortgage on house #2 (for all the remaining cash after renovation work, moving expenses, transaction costs, etc ) and recast the loan (reamortizing over the life of the loan for a tiny fee), and we were done! It worked well because while we had a lot of equity in house #1, it was definitely a market where contingencies were not an option, plus it gave us flexibility to maximize the transfer of equity but also spend a hefty chunk of cash on the new house cleaning it up before moving in. We owned both houses simultaneously for like 4 months in the process. Lenders don’t usually advertise the recasting option, but I think most will do it (and we did ask ahead of time, to confirm). I think it’s rarely used but powerful tool folks should consider more often.
Sure, a HELOC is another great option. And recasting also works well. Great suggestion.
Matt B.- agree! We did almost the same thing as you with a HELOC and recasting.
+1 for the HELOC. I actually kept and rent out home #1 where I have the open HELOC. When buying home #2 and using HELOC from home #1 for the downpayment, the bank did ask about the money and ultimately allowed it to be used for the downpayment. I think it helps to have additional assets that could cover the balance as re-assurance to the bank that you are solid financially.
“The second rule is to keep your housing costs to less than 20% of your gross income. That includes the mortgage, property taxes, insurance, and utilities”
So maintenance, repairs, outsourcing yard, furnishing would be excluded from the 20% then?
Bought a reasonably priced (for my area) house with a low interest rate but it’s 1940s old. Initially used the 2x income rule but all the repairs maintenance etc costing significantly more than expected so seeing if I should have used the 20 percent rule.
It’s just a rule of thumb, adapt it as you see fit I suppose.
What would be the least painful option if the marriage doesn’t work out? Not pleasant to think about, but this happens regularly. People who have an expensive house and a non-working spouse can be financially devastated in such a scenario.
I actually have a similar issue I’ve been considering, would love some advice or a kick in the butt to remind me of some obvious problem that I’m missing.
2 physician income, about 1.3 million/year. No debt. Current house (about 1.3 million) is paid off. Fully funded 529s (or at least on their way for our 3 kids), Fully funded IRA/Cash balance plans for both. Kids are in solid public schools. About 2 million in retirement accounts (total for both of us), and about 6 million in taxable accounts.
We are looking at a possible new house purchase (building on a lake lot) of about 3.5-4 million. Would you guys do a loan, pay it off completely, partially take a loan on part of it?
We are in our 40s, the thought process is our kids are young now and will enjoy the benefits of a large lake house sooner than later. Thanks in advance.
Depends on your financial goals. If we were working with MY financial goals, we’d probably pay cash. I’d be putting all of my savings toward it right now and maybe liquidate some of those taxable assets to make up the difference between your home equity + savings between now and then and the cost of the new place. But if you need or want to use more leverage to try to goose your investment returns a bit with leverage, borrowing 1-2.5 million wouldn’t be crazy.
It’s the old “pay off debt or invest” question. No right answer for everyone.
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/pay-off-debt-or-invest/
As long as we’re discussing rich-person problems…
I’m planning on buying a $10M house in 2-3 years when I retire. Current net worth is ~$70M, ~30% of it in cash after a recent liquidity event. I also hate debt, so do you think I should buy the new house in cash, and if so should I just keep that money in MM funds? Short term bonds haven’t done so well lately.
I would buy it in cash. Do you have some need to increase your returns using leverage? You might want to read this book:
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/the-value-of-debt-in-retirement-a-review/
Yes, I’d probably keep cash needed in 2 years in a MMF. But ST bonds wouldn’t be crazy.
I used a different method when we relocated two years ago: I settled on the new home before completing the sale on the old. I took out a large mortgage on the new place with an option for a one-time reset. When I sold the old place a month later, I poured the proceeds into the new home, and brought the mortgage down to a small and manageable monthly payment
Lots of interesting discussion on this topic today, including on the forum here:
https://forum.whitecoatinvestor.com/general-welcome/486959-discuss-latest-wci-blog-post-how-to-move-up-to-the-next-level-and-buy-a-multi-million-dollar-home
Lots of people seemingly appalled at anyone wanting such an expensive house, especially if they’re not forced to buy it in Manhattan, the Bay Area, DC etc. I figure if people make more than me and want more than me, that’s fine. A mortgage on most of the value of our post-renovation house wouldn’t be affordable on my physician salary so I can see both sides. This one came in by email:
We have emailed a few times over the years, and I have always appreciated your guidance. My family is in a similar situation to the WCIer from this post. Growing family. Looking to the intermediate term future, will need to upgrade to our forever home (welcomed baby #2 6 months ago, lord willing baby #3 will bless us in the next 2-3 years).
We close on a larger home next week. Not all that expensive by comparison to this family in question (600K); however, the home was built in 1935 and will need substantial renovations/additions before it is livable…. Admittedly, we are going to be doing a lot more than what we “need” to this next home, and total project cost will likely be ~3 million. We will stay in our current home until the next home is ready. Prob 24 months.
Long story long. We are using a security backed line of credit from commerce bank for the home purchase with a floating rate of prime minus 1%, and will likely try to use this LOC as much as possible for the renovation. Have 1.5mil in taxable account, so bank providing 1 million line of credit. When we get in the thick of the renovation we will also prob need a construction loan to finish the project.
My wife and I hate debt. Currently only have ~100k remaining on our current home. Probably 400K in equity. So these next few years are going to grind our gears some. However, we are using geographic arbitrage to our maximum advantage. Salary the last couple years has been 1.2 million, so we should be able to cash flow a lot of the construction costs and pay down debt quickly thereafter.
I would advise the gentleman in “the south” to shop local banks for SBLOC. I did have to transfer our investments “in kind” to a commerce account which was annoying, but the banker took care of most of these details. Was no cost to me to move assets. Now able to purchase next home with zero closing costs, which is nice.
Only question I have, how much house can we afford with salary of 1-1.2 million a year? What metric should we use???
And my answer:
I think the 2X guideline is reasonable. Keep your total debt on your homes to less than 2X your gross income.
Clearly with that example and some of these in the comments on the blog, there are plenty of docs out there who want to live in multi-million dollar homes, even if they’re not in a HCOLA. I can’t really blame them, I really like ours. Let’s keep this a safe place to discuss “first world problems.”
For the second home purchase, you can get some tax savings if you’re comfortable having it as a short term rental the first tax year that you own it. And the people who rent it don’t have to be strangers.
Especially with accelerated/bonus depreciation eh?
Consider buying an older home in a forever neighborhood and renovating instead to make it your forever home, and pay less tax and carrying costs in the price. A lot more cost effective, and much higher likelihood of building immediate equity. We also do not live in a high cost of living area, bought our house for $660,000, mind you this was in 2021, we spent approximately $600,000 in cash renovating the house over 2 years, combined household income > $2M per year. Market price of the house is around $1.1M now (irrelevant), and has all of the amenities we need and want. Mortgage is a 15 year at 2.75% interest, $5600 per month, property tax approximately $12K, and high tier insurance policy with top line coverage about $5K per year. Much less stressful than buying a $2.5-3.5M home, depleting savings, maybe not having money to personalize certain aspects of the home at that price point, high interest, and most importantly, being underwater if you have to sell in the next 3-5 years. Anybody with $3M lying around for a home would rather build their own monstrosity for that price than buy yours. Ask every doctor in my community, they’ve done it already.
With that income and net worth, I would focus more on saving than spending and upgrading. Shiny objects fade.
Save and then spend on experiences.
There is an interesting thing here. They said they live in the south. In most cities in the south you can purchase a very nice house for well under 2 million.
Here’s what we did….on a smaller scale.
We purchased our first home for $220k….about 20 years ago. We paid off the house after 15 years. We turned our first home into a rental, then purchased our second home and moved for $300k cash. Obviously, this is on a smaller scale. But with the first home paid off and second home paid with cash, it was really simple.
If considering a margin loan (option 6), talk to your existing discount broker and ask them to match Interactive Broker. You can usually get them to get pretty close if you have a decent 7 figure taxable portfolio there. If you threaten to move all your positions in-kind, Schwab and Fidelity will usually grant you something somewhat comparable.
Really enjoyed this post and reading everyone’s responses.
Anyway, we are one doc income of about 400k and spouse not in medicine with about 100k income, sometimes 150-180 if they are able to pick up some projects on the side.
Mid 6 figures in our retirement accounts combined and mid 6 figures in taxable accounts
Live in high income area in California so high state taxes as well. Want to move into a 2.5-3 mil house. Is that insane? We both don’t mind working till 59/60. Our family is still growing. Both of us entering into the 40 decade.
but rule of thumb here is not to stretch mortage to past 2x obviously CAli makes that hard but going past 4 is going to feel tight… (and even four)
So 1m downpayment? maybe even more because if the family (GD willing) is growing is the other spouse going to be able to work as hard
also Id argue working till 59 is retiring early not working late!
But of course there is another side to this whole thing
One of my neighbors brothers lives in an expensive part of Florida. Their family lived frugally, saved so he could afford their dream house ” responsibly”
But when they finally moved into it they felt a bit of regret about that because their oldest 2 were already out of the house and the other 2 will be hopefully within 5 or so years
Maybe it is the grass is always greener but also may be would be worth it to them to have to work a few extra years to get to enjoy that house when everyone was still at home
personal finance is personal
Is it insane? No, but if you borrow most of it you’ll definitely live a house poor style life for quite a while. First thing to think about is how attached you are to a HCOLA in CA.
Assuming geographic arbitrage isn’t an option, then the question is how much of a down payment to save up. Because even if you liquidate your taxable account and save all you can for a year or two, you’re still going to have a 4X ($2M+) mortgage.
Working until 60 might not be enough.
This is a nice juxtaposition with the post a couple days ago re: parenting intentionally to
avoid spoiling kids & raising competent adults who can live within a budget & problem solve.
I feel it is very important to really confirm this is best for everyone. The earning spouse will have much more pressure to earn to meet this lifestyle. It’s not a sure thing….. What if they have personal or employment challenges? Does the bigger house bring happiness or more well adjusted kids? I doubt it
I also make 7 figures
I am in southeast FL where after covid 1 mil homes are now 3 mil
While prices are slowly trending down I refuse to pay these prices and i am renting
if you buy a 3 mil house here even for cash your taxes, hoa, and insurance will be 6-7K a month
I am renting a house for around that
the extra money i save each month (about 60K) I use to fund cash balance plan and buy stkc market dips, many which have renclty occured
I think to be stuck in a house that expensive is insane. I dont think they can appreciate from here, seems like alrad ywonm 10-15% from peak and dopping and inventory is spiking huge
but people are still buying them, not doctors by the way, mostly trasnplants from NY, NJ, south americans, and russians, all of who I see dont even go to work so have no clue what any of them do but they all have a bentley and and lamborghini urus.
i would pay no more than 1.5 mi for a home and this is for a self employed specialsit making 1.2 mil a year plus invenstment income
I especially wouldnt buy it when the houses around me cost far less, youll never sell it
ide rather have 5-10 mil invested and live off the interest and dividends and rent a home than have a 3 mil home with taxes, ins, and HOA beign very high and all my wealth tied to the non liquid home
i am now seeing spoikes in my zip code of tax lein homes for sale as well which means people cant afford to pay property tax
just my two cents
thanks
great site
When calculating 20% of your income for housing cost what is the consensus about applying rental income and/or a military pension. Does this “guaranteed” “side” income take straight off the top of your housing expense or calculated into your total income?
My thoughts are that because I have multiple sources of income its acceptable to leverage more debt and have a higher debt to income ratio, anyone else have an opinion?
Use all income as part of your total income. Obviously not income property revenue, but your true cash flow from it.
I’d suggest reading The Value of Debt and make an informed decision about how much leverage risk you want to run in your life. Here’s a review I did of The Value of Debt in Retirement.
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/the-value-of-debt-in-retirement-a-review/
Is their current 1.1 million home extravagant for their area? If so, maybe less stressful financially to sell first so you aren’t left with something that could take a year to sell. If not maybe okay to only move once and sell after buying your new home. It could be stressful to have 4 million in real estate on a $600k income if you have trouble selling it.
Least financially stressful is selling first, temporary housing, and then buying but that’s also more hassle for your personal life.
The rates on the pledged asset line at Schwab seem off. For collateral of $1,000,000 to <$2,500,000, it's
SOFR + 2.90%, which is 7.26%
https://www.schwab.com/pledged-asset-line/rates
That may be because of the space between writing and publishing, or perhaps I just made an error. Either way, thanks for the correction.
I’d look at options to make their current home more spacious. I agree with almost everyone else, a 3 mil house is way too much of a stretch for these folks. Anything happens and you have no buffer whatsoever. Even a bout of burnout is enough. You need a buffer, even just for psychological reasons, you never know what is coming your way. I understand it is not easy when you see your older partners living in 3-5 million dollar homes. Just remember, we bought those homes when they were much cheaper. I would never qualify for a mortgage for the current value of my house.
One option that you didn’t mention, and which is insufficiently idiot-proof for me, but may be the best choice is to sell box spreads as a way of borrowing against the portfolio at a very small premium over the risk-free rate. Here is an article that runs through it a bit.
https://thefinancebuff.com/short-box-spread-vs-margin-loan-fidelity.html
You should look into short box spreads as a bridge loan.
https://thefinancebuff.com/short-box-spread-vs-margin-loan-fidelity.html#htoc-how-to-do-it
Not sure the juice is worth the squeeze. Talking about adding complexity to your life. Better run the numbers and see if it’s worth it to you.