How to structure a real estate investment company

[James Karhan]

Firstly hello everyone, my first post here but I've been consuming a lot from this community over the last 3 months.

I'm currently looking at closing on a new property which will become my primary residence. I will then be looking to rent out my old house. I'm in talks with a lawyer to form an LLC for that now. Which has got my brain going around what my ultimate goal for the LLC is. Currently my personal holdings are enough to justify creating an LLC for at the very least the asset protections they can afford (I've read that is the first questions to answer before making an LLC)

I plan to over the next 5 years acquire a minimum of 5 more properties. After the first year of owning each house I will likely only have 20% equity in that house. Would it be best to just contain everything in a single LLC or should I split up the different properties into different LLCs? I will be the only member of the LLC at least for the first 5 years but likely indefinitely.

If I was to lease a property to my own LLC and then the LLC was to sublet it does the LLC in that situation provide any protection? I assume because I own the house a judge would in theory be able to pierce the veil of the LLC and come for my personal assets?

My current house (the one I will rent) still has a mortgage on it. How complex will it be to transfer this mortgage to an LLC?

If you can't tell I'm pretty green behind the ears for pretty much all of this, opening an LLC, renting property, real estate in general. So I'm open to any and all advice, if there are questions I'm not asking and should be I'd love to know. Thanks for any and all feedback.