Paid Off Rustic Home - Rent It Out?

[Jack Boyd]

Three years ago we bought a dilapidated 130 year old farmhouse that will be completely paid off in a few months. The location is great - there are only six other houses on the semi-rural street that range in price from $300k to 1.5M. Our place is definitely the lowest rung on the ladder but the neighbors seem to appreciate how we've cleaned up the property by taking down dozens of old trees and adding giant gardens, fruit trees and even have a self-serve market stand that made enough last year to make three house payments. As great as it is, we would like a bigger, more rural property. But, we also would like invest in rental properties to grow our wealth as we are nearing 50 and have no savings or retirement in place (as we are cleaning up the last of our debt, about 20K in credit cards). We own a successful business and are fortunate to not have to rely on W-2 employment. 

Our questions are:

1) Do we rent the paid off farmhouse out and use the cash flow to pay down our mortgage on a bigger and better property? The only problem with this is it's going to take a special kind of tenant (family member or friend) as the house has its quirks and foundational problems. It's solid, there's definitely some slanted floors and rinky-dink plumbing. 

2) Do we continue to live in the farmhouse and use the equity to do a BRRRR, pay off debt and grow our savings?

3) Do we live in the farmhouse and do a focus on fix-and-flips? In reality, I have no desire to be a landlord but real estate seems like the best option to set ourselves up for retirement. We're pretty simple people and don't need a lot of property or playthings to be happy. 

4) Air BNB's make me want to puke and seem to crashing, but given the uniqueness of property it could be a possibility. Or given it's rustic-ness, would it be too dangerous and put us at risk of being sued?

Any advice or other options would be much appreciated!