Note that using a spouse's hours can help you meet the material participation requirements.

Your deal was underwritten using a 5-year hold period, with a conservative average rental growth of 1.7% and  average expense growth of 5.8%.

You can make this look better by using a HELOC or 2nd mortgage, you don't necessarily have to sell. 

This could be with using a purchased rental investment property or using a STR arbitrage (sub-leased from a landlord) property. 

Christina will go deep into where has the market moved to what might be coming in this next year in residential real estate.Bio:Over the last 15 years as a real estate investing mentor, Christina found the greatest obstacle her clients faced was an overwhelming amount of information about investment real estate that didn't produce the results they needed.She created the Live A Rich Life - Real Estate Investment Workshop to simplify the process so people could get started at a pace they could handle, using a system that maximized results.

Also heard about people using a trust with the owners name in it to make it look like estate planning or asset protection instead of a sale.

You didn’t include using a vacation house that is paid for by someone else.

My brother has the same 10 units (2 separate sets of 5-unit) townhouses built next to this property so I will be using a floor plan similar to his units. 

Rather than simply accessing part of the equity using a cash-out refi you could sell one of those properties and use the proceeds (now with 100% of the equity available including the deferred tax) to purchase two replacement properties.  

Purchase price: $350,000 Cash invested: $10,000 Sale price: $450,000 Bought this single family residence in 2021as my primary residence using a 0% down loan to get in.