My understanding is the cost goes from roughly $1,200 for a normal 1031 to about $5-8K for a reverse 1031.  

The ability to find a good sales price under $200K with low taxes and affordable insurance is getting harder to find but in Oh & IN its still easy.Inventory is strong and the rents are above normal so even though your under $200K you can still earn a good profit.

House hacking a 4 plex is a good plan, and you may even consider getting normal financing with 20% down - just have a little more patience to save more to have adequate reserves.

It’s normal to feel overwhelmed at first, but just take it one step at a time.

I normally do not encourage people to forrm entities for real estate, but if I were investing out of state I would have the out of state investments placed in an LLC chartered in that state. 

Something of this magnitude would normally have a newspaper article, or a publicly accessible court docket.

All normal emotions for going through the tedious construction process. 

i.e. longer than normal vacancy, bad tenant screening, poor maintenance, skipped rent payments, etc.There could be a handful of reasons why it lost it's ability to cash flow.

We are also temporary heat providers for most large construction projects in and around Buffalo NY, neither I nor anyone in the industry that I know if has been contacted about setting up temporary heat for this project which is normally one of the first steps before a project gets into winter. thats a nice cottage industry winter heat.. 

Feeling overwhelmed is totally normal—it means you're taking this seriously.