Prepare financially by saving for down payments, improving your credit score, and setting aside emergency reserves.

Use umbrella insurance as an additional safeguard, especially if you opt not to form an LLC.Avoid S-Corp taxation for rentals, as rental income is passive and not subject to self-employment tax. S

It wasn’t pretty, but that’s how I scaled up buying and holding 29 SFR without using my savings to acquire these houses.

Saving $10 to miss out on proper data that leads you to a $40k deal is not worth it. 

Out of my 32 properties, I’ve seen insurance rates drop by up to 40% on renewals, and property tax increases are finally slowing down compared to the crazy jumps we saw over the last five years.

True re the prior poster, re this helping the seller save their credit, if you buy sub-to you will dramatically raise their FICO since the mortgage will show on-time payments.  

I reduced my responsibility to only taxes/insurance while the tenant buyer does the maintenance, pays utilities and makes monthly payments to me. 

@Chris Seveney, do you pay self-employment taxes on your interest income from money you have in savings that is also taxed as ordinary income?

I recommend that you find a trusted or recommended Mortgage Loan Originator (MLO), who can give you options for property-based loans (mostly investment loans) and they don't use your taxes but the P&L of the property.

This might make sense, but again, you are just deferring the taxes and now pushing tax from capital gains to ordinary income.