This starts early on with preventing what could potentially go wrong by attracting an awesome tenant and looking at what vulnerabilites currently exist in your property.  

Originally posted by @Denise Evans:@Jared Irby is correct, @Dion DePaoli is wrong.

Just sounds like too much that go wrong on the hot tub side, but also the guest side. 

Get the match at the very minimum.Nothing wrong with putting money in your 401k, and check with your admin if you can take out a loan to buy a primary from your 401.

From the ownership side the advantage is if we project the numbers wrong and the value is less post-renovation, my all-in cost is less which makes it less likely to lose money. 

Nothing wrong with his opinion, ours is just different.You should consider both and figure out what works for YOU!

I could be totally wrong though!

Again in my limited knowledge it seems like multi-family has the better numbers but I could be wrong.

I just want to confirm, I am not opposed to LLC's and have them, but 99% of people set them up wrong by first buying a proeprty, having a loan on it, then just transferring it to the LLC.

Part of the problem is that I picked the wrong market for exchange.