It's a good practice to overestimate costs and underestimate after-repair values (ARV) to keep your expectations realistic.

While I’m happy to discuss general strategies and best practices, I won’t be sharing additional details about the property’s exact location, nearby city, or financials at this time.

It’s standard practice and an essential safeguard for landlords.Trust your instincts and treat this as a non-negotiable policy.

Best practice is to ask them if they consider hard money cash. 

I will not comment as to the tax laws and underlying rules - that is a discussion you can have with your tax advisor who presumably you are paying to help you.What I will do is provide practical and business guidance on tracking time.Firstly, there are apps available that can assist with time tracking where you can specifically detail your time, who you met with, etc.

This is a practice by some less than reputable companies.

If you have multiple LLCs, best practice would be having a Plus subscription.  

And oh I have heard that about the majority of people not actually practicing. 

That alone was the biggest improvement for my business practices and allowed me to take all of my bookkeeping in-house and eliminate the expense I was shelling out for a bookkeeper.

A person who has spent his 2000 to 4000 minimum CPA practice hours doing foreign currency conversions at Deloitte for a Belgian energy company may not know the first thing about real estate or anything else.