I think the ultimate question here is what are you using the HELOC for? 

For fulfillment you can do it yourself to save money if you are broke, but ultimately if you want better response rates and focusing your time on value-add, then you will want to outsource fulfillment to a shop that has economies of scale and can offer you great rates.

This is ultimately why I asked the question.

On the other hand, I knew several apartment owners and commercial property owners that managed to survive the last crash without much impact.

they will call threaten beat their chest but you buy at trustee sale and you don't owe them. they are not super liens like other states were utls can survive.only thing that survives a west coast foreclosure is IRS  and some senior deferral tax's and ad valorum. everything else junior to the DT or not recorded goes away.. 

My laymen assumption is that the nicer the school district, the higher the property tax which ultimately hurts ROI.

I like to think about it in terms of tangible things I can do, action I can take to retrain my brain and ultimately change or grow my mindset.

Ultimately at the moment I'm still torn on selling now and getting into possible a better deal like a house hack or something with no HOA. 

Or is it very similar to retail where appreciation & paying down the mortgage will ultimately give you the equity?

**So my question ultimately is, do i have a viable path to multifamily house hacking yet if i were to leverage these funds?