A 1031 exchange would seem to make a lot of sense, but you need to have a firm plan in place to execute on this when you sell. 

He gave me a $50K business line of credit and his staff has always been easy to work with when I simply call them.

Feel free to inquire about their staff qualifications if it's a larger organization.2.

Take a policy loan against the cash value (5-6% current loan rates) in advance of the auction so cash is on-hand, purchase real estate, execute business plan on home, repay policy loan, and repeat. 

I'm invested in a property near the Grove that's executing that business plan now.At a simpler level, that might mean buying a house with a garage, converting the garage into an ADU, and renting out the ADU.I think a super solid first step to get into the LA market is to househack a home or a multifamily.

The (property management) owners had great knowledge, answers, and talked about their systems, but that didn't translate to execution at the manager level.

Support staff are overwhelmed.

So the ratio between income and home price is important, this strategy would not work if one is having low salary or median salary.This is why if someone could make 200k and live in Austin where home is still 400k, they could be millionaire in 9-12 years by executing this.

What rate percentage drop would justify executing a refinance to lock in a lower interest rate in your professional opinion?

Looking at the Citrona website, I see basic spelling mistakes, a lack of executive/owner bios, and no case studies showing the financials for some of your projects (which is surprising as one of the founders worked for 10 years at a financial services firm).