Now I understand the differences the pieces all fell into place! 

Found a desirable water front area but due to flood FEMA is requiring property to be raised. First thought to come to my head..."Always wanted to drive a bulldozer." Anyone have experience doing a complete demo of a h...

Nothing to add to the education piece but I'll definitely stay engaged with this conversation.

Now if you and the LLC purchased the property as tenants in common (LLC 75% and you as 25%) then you would be living in a piece of real estate that you own and when it sold you could indeed take the portion that you owned and lived in tax free once you could establish that you had lived in the property fro 2 out of the previous 5 years prior to sale.

That would be correct if OP's father has made or intends to make an S election for the LLC.Since OP did not specify tax status of the SMLLC, we're left to assume no alternate election was made, and the LLC carries the default tax status: 'Disregarded Entity'.A DRE should not be issuing W-2s or 1099s to its owner as it's effectively dissolved for federal income tax purposes and there's no distinction between the owner and the LLC.

I often read bits and pieces of all of these books to refresh concepts and also to help re-enforce the wealth building mindset. 

Every other piece of advice you're going to get is true, too! 

And yes... very sweet :-)In my mind, trying to find a place that's going to appreciate is a LOT harder and I would move from "investing" into "speculating"  There's nothing wrong with hedging your bet and doing your research and trying to make sure you're not going into an area that's *completely* going to tank, but I've found that when you start speculating on future prices, you start down the path of just what you described... one piece of information says this, another says that... and they're both at odds with each other. 

At that point you transfer the property into a Land Trust, which is a type of trust that is created by a trust agreement for the sole purpose of owning a specific piece of property.

Right now, we have an opportunity to submit a bid on a piece of land that would yield an incredible return if we built on it.