Do they have to go through eviction processes as well? 

My main question is whether it makes more sense to go the seller financing route and pay off the principal in 8–10 years or stick with a standard 30-year loan.My thinking is that the tax deductions from a mortgage wouldn’t outweigh the potential equity I could gain over those 8–10 years.

USDA does not.If you have a job gap (6+ months of unemployment) on an FHA loan, then you have to go back 2 years prior to the job gap AND be back to work for 6 months before you are eligible.How to avoid this? 

Which is why I pay more, for less cash flow in highly desirable areas.In high income areas, rent is a lower proportion of income so therefore your tenants have a higher capacity for paying higher rent because rent is less than 20% or even 10% of their income.

My wife and I on the search for our 5th property and looking to go for a 6-12 unit multi-family.

BRRRR method is also a great way to go - good luck!  

If it's a deal that is in a very very desirable location and has tons of built in equity and appreciation, I would be totally good with negative cash flow for Y1 and Y2.

The right team should have every system in place for you to be able to go from novice investor to experienced investor after one deal.  

None were a match for me personally and many were not a strategy I wanted or too speculative (such as opportunistic strategy which is the riskiest strategy or investing in tertiary markets which also tend to be the first to go belly up when there is trouble etc).You probably actually want to look at your operating agreement to see what rights you have to books and records, etc. 

I just didn't know if there was a better way to go about it.