The property tax increases, 17% recently on the Indy suburb house have reduced my cash flow. 

The price was reduced to $549,00 a couple weeks late.

After he implemented the RUBS, he actually reduced the rent a bit to enable the user to adjust to the new extra billing.  

So that comes out to be $40K per home in the end.But during the DD, I've found instead of 40 vacant pads, only 35 vacant pads are usable, so there is a loss of 5 spaces for me.What is a FAIR way (to both sides) of reducing the purchase price to account for the missing 5 vacant pads?

Unless your Heloc rate is well over 9%, youre better off just applying your excess cashflow toward paying down the Heloc balance, which will immediately reduce the interest that accrues the following month.

The real estate appreciation, you can reduce your taxable income, and the interest on your mortgage is usually deductible, which is a nice bonus.

A cash-out refinance can reduce your credit utilization and improve your credit score.

To intentionally reduce the leverage more than required is a foreign concept to me.Best wishesDan, financially you are, of course, correct.  

The goal is to create paper losses that offset your wife’s W2 income, reducing your tax bill. 

If you sell your new property for $20K less than you bought it then that would have the impact of reducing the profit on your old property by $20K.