Seller reports NOI: 108,101, Gross carwash income: 149,546, Cap Rate: 11.5%.

They have no understanding of compound interest, time value of money, return on investment, cap rate, or anything involving math of any sort10.

You paid $2m for it two years ago w/ 25% down (it was suffering from mismanagement and deferred maintenance), invested $325k in capital improvements, and it's now valued at $3m with an NOI of $195k (cap rate assuming $3m value is 6.5%).

If you do that, you must put a cap on taxes, insurance, and repairs......and that will never happen. 

Indio is currently STR friendly as well as the HOA but I've heard there may be caps coming soon by the HOA - we wouldn't have to worry yet. 

I've calculated the cap rates and they are all generally similar (~4.5%).

CAP rate or wholesale value. 

I could lower the price, but need to make $4200 to break even after 8% vacancy, maintenance 5%,  5% cap ex, monthly utilities, etc.

Hopefully you did not pay too much for the dirt. 1 acre is optimal these days because of desired double to triple drive thru for QSR.It can become a problem because if they make the building smaller you get less rent but they do more sales.Example a QSR used to be 3,000 to 4,000 sq ft but now instead wants double drive thru's as not many go inside for fast food like pre-covid.If you get 1,000 a foot less at 30 a foot you just lost 30k NOI and now at 5 cap example paying all cash NNN once developed you have lost 600k value.It can fine as long as you do not overpay for the land.

I had a beer with my brother recently and after I laid out my path forward with all the numbers involved, he said “you can’t afford to stay” … pension won’t be worth enough to justify staying in a job that has a pretty hard cap on earnings for a pension that won’t be worth enough to make a difference in my life, let alone the lives of my children.