STR Newbies - Running the numbers & TAXES in particular

[Gina Russoniello Tiwari]

Hello wonderful BP community, 

Spouse and I are looking to get started in the STR business. We are new to RE investing in general (so far our only RE holding is a passive LP interest in a RE fund). We are trying to follow Brandon's advice and run the numbers on about "100 potential deals" before we strike. In doing our research on the BP site so far, we came across the massively helpful STR income calculator shared by the author of this article:

https://www.biggerpockets.com/...

Being brand new to this, however, we don’t know what to plug in as our applicable tax rate. Husband is employed full time (W-2) in healthcare and I recently switched from a W-2 to a 1099 independent contractor position as a lawyer (I’m giving these details to point out that our main business/income is not our RE holdings, but we’d love for it to someday be). We know what our tax rate was as a married couple last year, but not sure if that’s helpful here. 

Ultimately my questions are: 

1. Does our income generated by our "STR business" (say we form a company to hold a handful of properties) have an income tax rate that is separate from our own personal rate, or do we just claim the income on our own personal tax return (subject to applicable deductions)?

2. If you run a STR business, do you pay the additional self-employment tax rate on the income your STRs generate?

3. Any other tips you guys have (related to taxes or otherwise) to take into account while running the numbers on our potential deals?

Note: I'll ultimately run these questions by our accountant too, but wanted to start here to see if any more experienced STR folks would be willing to share insights on what you've been doing.

Thank you!

Gina