These states impose a state tax on any realized gains from the sale of investment properties.

Finding which of those strategies works best for you, your goals and interests could help you speed up your investment journey while gaining experience, confidence and eventually expertise in your chosen area. 

Many guests don't pay attention to photos and if it's listed as a 3 bed, that is the expectation they have of the property.

If you lived in the property you can sell it to capture the equity without paying taxes on those gains.

In that situation, I personally would not be investing in direct real estate at all.If I wanted exposure to a foreign real estate market, I would invest passively and hire a manager that has years more experience than I could ever hope to gain, and whose job is to supervise and watch everything and make sure that it goes well.Just my $0.02.And whatever you decide to do: good luck.

To stand on a person’s property and blatantly misrepresent to gain access is most agitating.

This is a two-way interview, so have a short list of questions to ask the mentor (What books do you recommend I read to gain a better understanding?

I subscribe to the strategy to list a property to get the most attention to the listings.

Unfortunately it sounds like you've already missed your capital gains exclusion if you've been renting it out for more than 3 years, as it's 2 of the past 5 years. 

It recently dawned on me the idea of a non military affiliated individual assuming a VA loan, would this individual be able to then also gain the benefit of using an IRRRL since they have now acquired a VA loan through assumption?