The seller has the two lots legally separated, but due to deed restriction imposed by the subdivision development, found that building a house on the “tennis court” lot was not allowable. 

Looking to get into some smaller apartment buildings in the near future.As far as the difficulties of investing in Japan, I of course agree with everything said, but in my case I'm at near-native fluency and own and manage my own business separate from anything real estate related so even without permanent residency I've never had trouble getting a loan (except of course I can't get some govt backed ones like a primary residence mortgage) for business or investing.I'll try to get in touch with everyone local to よろしくお願いします。

I also have separate damage protection from my channel manager (OR), but you can get it from Waivo and some others. ive just heard too many horror stories and i bake the price of coverage into my rental costs.

You can stack your personal 50%s up for separate ventures while still knocking out deals without your own capital2) Read Raising Private Capital by Matt Faircloth3) One LLC with the S Corp designation to pay yourself a reasonable salary from the flip profits.

.- multiple indoor common areas (think 2 separate tv setups). - exterior "usable square footage" (think covered patio, pergolas).- extra storage space so tenants don't feel the need to squeeze their entire lives into one room (extra garage space, attic, detached shed)- room for 2 full refrigerators!

I'm writing a separate comment, "Part 3" to address this controversy.

I would first separate out the original purchase price between building and land.

This way you can access old records without having to recreate them on a separate platform. 

Challenge: It's in a neighborhood (no HOA), and renting the entire property (sleeps 25 in total) caused problems in the neighborhood, due to noise and parties – so we only rent the separate cabins now.

Like Jake Baker suggested, keep good records and have a dedicated bank account for your property, properly separating personal and business expenses.