Rather the equity than the taxable gain.

If you plan on keeping it a long time I may wait to fix it but if its something you would consider selling in the next 5 years I would get it fixed as going to sell it you will need to repair it and costs to fix this are not gonna get cheaper as time moves on. 

Those are built like a tank and you can refinish over and over again.Just be prepared to have more ongoing repairs with the cheaper materials used on a property like that.

I speculated that the cheaper cabins were likely due to being on leased forest service land.

Averaging $1k/mo per bedroom which is now on the cheaper side of things. 

Back 25 years ago I was named in two lawsuits solely because the plaintiff attorneys found out I was raising capital for a new investment fund, and they knew it would be cheaper for me to pay them off then to have to disclose the lawsuit in the Private Placement Memorandum.  

We have never financed a car before and have always bought used, driven it and resold for higher than purchased price after driving a year or 2.Since reading on here, if we find even a 2020 Honda with all the features with low mileage and cheaper, yes that would work too.

I run into this issue frequently where NJ investors are looking into out of state thinking it is cheaper, that's not always the case. 

Doss Docs are cheaper than Lightning Docs from Geraci and they can cater to junior lien positions and cross-collateralizations, too.

Downsize rent when you can and maybe even consider moving somewhere cheaper.