When the whole covid shutdown occurred, I dropped out of college to help my father's service business maintaining and remodeling residential and commercial buildings.

or3) If I convert the partnership interest into a private UPREIT, then I trigger tax if/when I sell the Shares in the REIT?

Excess depreciation could be suspended as a passive loss unless you qualify as a Real Estate Professional (REPS) or materially participate in a Short-Term Rental (STR)—which would allow you to use the additional depreciation to offset W-2 or business income.

We're in the business to make money right?

How do you approach educating people on the realities of the business? 

There are people who have an entire business helping you set up and design a STR relatively quickly (3-7 days) depending on size of home and complexity but you are going to be paying a bit of a premium but you do save on the headache.

Building a real estate portfolio might be attractive, but if you're crunched for time, perhaps you could do private lending in a SDIRA or get into syndications.

Hey @Krissi Miramontes Small world, I have a former client in Fair Oaks, or at least her business is there.

So, get busy on your listings. 

This is a business.