I’m hoping that once I do have enough saved I can buy the second property and continue house hacking.

Based on an inspection report on one of the deals I worked on last year, I was able to negotiate over $15k of credits and repairs for a $200k house using a $400 inspection report for one of my clients.

I also paid interest on the loans.Is the utilities for the house that is completed and rented a expense deduction for the year or does it go into the basis?

With this strategy, we knew exactly how each house was operating and we could intervene or change leadership of the house if necessary to assure operations were going as we expected. 

Quote from @Edgar Duarte: hi allI would love to get some perspective from your expertise, we have a property that we would have to sell in 2025 to avoid paying taxes on the capital gains, we believe we rcan sell it for $700K and get an equity of almost $500K after paying the mortgage balance, if we invest all of it option in index funds at 7% rate (standard com growth calculator), or in more rental properties as we are all here for, I can get the equity of around $900K.option B would be keep paying the house at 2.3% int rate while we have it in AirBnB and maybe sell it in 10 years for $900K, knowing that we would be paying taxes but it is not that bad still. or we can 1031 at that point?

In addition we do not accept any applications for longer move in than the remainder of the current month and the next month (so if tenant is unable to move in by march 1, they cannot apply until feb 1 as we are unwilling to go longer than that without rent and will hold another open house).S8 needs to streamline their process if they want to increase their housing options.Best wishes

In my personal opinion, it's the land that is appreciating, not the house.

@Jahniya Butlercan you start with a house hack instead? 

I have long form articles on both this Fair Housing law with section 8 and the scam tenants with fake info on our website.  

@Keith Mintz Will you be running the house or leasing to a company that does sober living.