-A water heater issue resulted in repeated mismanagement—confusing unit assignments—leading to extra costs to fix the same issue 3 times and on each occasion "more fixes" needed to the water heaters that I plumber said was needed.

Much more than a forum answer post can hold. 

Personally I like to build with cash to avoid the extra expenses, so I dont actually finance anything until its done and I have decided to hold it.

@Jacob HripWhen paying with cash, you have fewer closing costs (no lender fees) and fewer holding costs (no interest payments).

However, if you start holding properties in an LLC, you don’t want to flip properties in the same LLC.

The plan is to buy and hold. 

We didn't buy much from the MLS and if we did, it was either a "handyman special" or it had been on the market 180+ days with a motivated seller willing to take less than market value.This will be the "new normal" going forward and a lot of newer investors will drop out of the acquisition market and just hold what they have.

Also make sure you are comfortable with some holding costs if the units don't get rented right away (if vacant).Also look into if there is rent control in the area that the property is located.

Now most of the time we don't see househackers/investors use in-house or portfolio loans from banks because sometimes they have more restrictive guidelines and higher fees for holding it which might cause the numbers not to work or for the deal not to go through entirely. 

@Wesley Sherow would love to learn about your PM-co as I’m looking to buy-and-hold in Capital Region.I’d be curious to hear y’all thoughts on the Amazon/Regeneron hiring impact.