This tax is assessed on business income inside of tax-exempt entities or organizations (IRA falls into this category).

Agree it is difficult to assess costs when they vary so much by location.Keep in mind that some turnovers are sickenly expensive, and that is just the nature of the business. 

He added on to his garage and did a lot more than I'm going to do, and his developer fee (then only school district assessment) not counting building/planning fees was $2,100. 

A reserve is unnecessary, but I still keep around $15,000 - $20,000 in my account.The point is, that you should sit down and assess your finances to determine what the worst-case scenario may look like, how much you would need to cover it without impacting your life, and whether you will need to build a reserve.

Start networking with other investors to increase your access to real estate deals.Put your house on the market yourself on Zillow and Facebook marketplace and see if you can sell it yourself as a seller finance deal on what is called a wrap mortgage; especially if you have a low interest.

Typically, the tax is based on the assessed fair market value of the property at the time of the transfer, even if it’s not a traditional sale.

There has been a squatter living in it for about 3 years, that refuses access to anyone that I have sent out there to assess the property.Safeguard personnel stopped communication with me last year. 

While Facebook Marketplace isn't the sketchiest site (craigslist), I personally would never give my ID across it.

I do see lots of self storage and warehouses going up, so my default assumption would be that the old shopping malls do NOT trade for less than build cost, but it's possible that the marketplace is not perfectly efficient. 

I am just starting out with a STR and found that VRBO is not very specific if they are collecting the tax and paying it to the State as a marketplace facilitator or am I responsible for this tax collection and payment ?