I would be surprised to see a mortgage without an alienation clause or due on sale clause or due on transfer clause; not saying they don't exist ...And I will guess that you have a single member LLC.

Put it on the market and see what the market will bring - you can always chose to not sell if the numbers aren't good enough but I think you will be surprised at what houses are selling for.4.

I am surprised that I must use the value at the time I purchased the home instead of at the time it became a rental (which was three years later).  

to create your LLCI have reach out to all of the above, but no once seems to do it all or having experience with all of it, which surprised me.

You'd be surprised at the number of people advertising "turnkey" that give very different answers to those questions when asked by investors. 

My 2 cents, I was surprised to learn on a DSCR loan I was looking into, there was a prepayment penalty, as I was hoping to cashout refi when the rateds dropped...at some point :( 

That being said even if surprisingly enough there was no appreciation in a California market for 2 years you would still be able to write off your things like depreciation and your expenses so there would be benefits to owning the duplex.

Both trad & Roth IRAs are subject to UDFI tax (surprise!). 

Refine as you go.And hopefully you are publishing this where the guests see it up front so they aren't caught by surprise.

But, dude, the permit surprise sounds like a headache.