I “assume” they meant you wouldn’t defer all your taxes if you used leverage on a $450k purchase instead of “spending” all your cash.

On average, you will spend 10% of your income on maintenance per year.

If you're earning primarily W-2 wages, interest, or dividends, those attractive depreciation deductions from your cost segregation study will be suspended.Think about it this way: You might spend $10,000-$15,000 on a cost segregation study, expecting immediate tax savings, only to find those deductions suspended indefinitely.Does this mean cost segregation studies are worthless?

If you had also spend money on renovations and improvements while occupying those should have gone into service then as well. 

We plan to spend the next 6-12 months continuing to earn and save, as well as nail down a final market we want to househack in.

However I haven't found any clarification on this aspect yet. 

The number one mistake that I saw buyers making was jumping right into negotiating (and not very good negotiating at that) without first spending the time to build rapport.

I think this actually happens all over the world, but some landlords will increase their rent to the amount that the US government is willing to spend on rent in that location.

You want to have your financial house in order so you know what you CAN afford and what you SHOULD spend.

I have always been willing to take vouchers, so that aspect did not affect me when the law changed.