It will crash and burn again.

While this figure takes some work to arrive at, there’s nothing illusory about it.

What I find with 6 month leases is that the tenants all stay longer....they wanted the flexibility when they arrived.

. - doesn't jiveshe arrived to see the property in an Uber, a small compact car with her 3 big kids she owns a 2012 Toyota, that's ither furniture didn't look very nice, cheap, and hardly any, she has boxes of junk though.she let me know she was going to do the landscape (pick weeds), - how many people making that much money are out there picking weeds, btw, weeds still there.

Depending on appreciation was how people lost their shirts in the last market crash, so I definitely don't recommend that strategy (and speculation isn't really a strategy anyway).It's good that you were able to keep them as rentals as a backup strategy. 

Show separately for 2017 and the 3 preceding years: gross sales, cost of goods sold, gross profit, percentage of gross profit to gross sales, amounts collected, and gross profit on amounts collected.It seems, after reading this, that your solution would be the correct one - enter the gross profit for each year on Line 1 of Schedule C with a separate statement attached to the return describing the installment sale and how you arrived at the gross profit. 

Another related question: Where do owners go when guests arrive? 

They shouldn't necessarily dread your arrival

I'd love to pick up one just to have a crash pad while we are down there.

In the last crash HELOC rates rose above yields for many so called, home rich "investors."