15.3% Self-employment taxes is a lot.Scenario 1 - You do a cost segregation study in year 1 and create a huge loss to offset your other income, great for year 1.Horrible for years after 1 as you used up a majority of your depreciation and now your net income will be subject to 15.3%.If your depreciation is mostly used up and don't plan to have net income, your business is not profitable.Scenario 2 - No cost segregation study is done and your depreciation is calculated over 39 years(low depreciation rate, you will likely be paying some sort of net income subject to 15.3%.Maybe not in year 1 if you have a lot of furnishings installed.

Is it possible to get get someone with some experience in these types of developments on as a partner of some sort?

Hello, I think it’s really awesome that you’re just now beginning and you are already coming to the forums to learn so the first thing you need to do is to continue to stay on the forms and you also need to be reading all of the bigger pocketbook and start listening to their podcast to soak up as much knowledge as you can and as long as you do that, you will have all the knowledge you need to start and regarding your question I do not advise to buy a single-family house just to live in it without a rental property aspect so it’s OK if you want to live in the house as well but you will have to either get a multifamily property or you could also buy a single-family home and rent out the other rooms  now see when you have a property that you use just for your family then you have to pay the mortgage every month which is building your equity, but that responsibility is solely on you whereas if it has some sort of rental property aspect, there will be other people helping you build that equity if you were to buy a property just for yourself that is something that will be taking money out of your pocket every month while as a rental property if you buy right will be putting money in your pocket every month the only exception to what I just said is if you buy a property for yourself or just for your family to live in, you could do a live-in flip to where as you’re living in the property you rehab it while your living there and if you buy right with enough knowledge, then when you turn around to sell the property, you will make profit

The varied opinions means that you can sort through and select the ones that suits you best. 

So everything that they touch has some sort of risk.

Maybe right down town in the financial districts.. but you can go to any big city in the mid west rust belt deep south and find all sorts of vacant commercial..

I don't see a home gym as any sort of additional liability, provided that you have machines that are relatively idiot proof and are not inherently dangerous.

I have had cash tenants and Sect. 8 that display that sort of mindset and usually you can see it in the screening process.....as soon as I see it, I am able to gracefully slip out of the conversation and go a different direction.   

Anything that is almost guaranteed to be used daily in your rentals (i.e. couches, bed, chairs), I'd try to invest in as much quality as you can for those specific items.Some store sites will let you filter for "contract grade" or "commercial grade" items - these are the sorts of furnishing that get put into higher-use commercial applications such as hotel lobbies, apartment building amenity spaces, etc. 

I was previously told that only the owner could make any sort of deal before auction, since the attorney doesn't represent them.I find this all very fascinating.