After a year+ of unreliable management, I finally decided to switch to a new company.

That said, a VA loan charges you a guarantee fee that is financed into the loan.

This creates a negative initial position.

The wife had a local business and the husband had a good job.

My thoughts: don't get set on just one trend since your goal is to purchase in 2026, as we've all experienced, a lot can happen in a year.  

However, the IRS will only allow a husband/wife LLC to be taxed as a single member LLC in community property states. 

Never built in Houston before so take my feedback with a grain of salt but I'd put money on it being impossible to build a duplex from scratch for $125 a foot (including everything from drawings, engineering, permit fees, general conditions, labor, material, landscaping).Out here in AZ the builder cost is going to be $200 a foot at best, but add 20% on top of that for the client cost.

Until you have to do a major repair like a roof.  

A tenant doesn't choose how to pay, a landlord does.

The thing that you have to remember is that the path of progress and a neighborhood "turning over" moves at a glacial pace.