All will tell you they do this to build their business.This is what I do when I attend a REI club: Go early.

Keep in mind that only the "building basis" can be segregated and will benefit from accelerated depreciation.

Now I am brand new to real estate so this could be dumb but I'm reading Brandon Turners "Rental Property Investing" book and I was intrigued by chapter 3 where he list out 4 plans to start with when getting into real estate.

My idea was I could live there immediately and also do all the minor work that would not require an actual tradesmen, which would allow me to start building equity.

In my market, which is a fairly economical place to build, I am friends with full time builders that are in their properties about $150k/door for construction level finishes.  

This does not align with buying most buildings in cash.Once you progress in your investing efforts you may come across more UHNW individuals, family offices and institutions who would take the lower return for limiting risk (all cash deal).

Is this a new build?  

A reserve is unnecessary, but I still keep around $15,000 - $20,000 in my account.The point is, that you should sit down and assess your finances to determine what the worst-case scenario may look like, how much you would need to cover it without impacting your life, and whether you will need to build a reserve.

The options are, demo the lot, split the lot and then sell 2 lots to the builder or build myself.

But my experience over the last 10 years of building new homes is that NOTHING comes down might stay the same but will rise almost annually Like Cement always goes up in Jan.