I'm now finally here in person, and have started to go view places in person with the intent of purchasing. 

The factors to consider are your overall objectives, your credit score, DTI and personal financial condition I recommend you find a broker or originator whom you can trust and have them weigh your options.

All businesses can hit speed bumps during any growth period. 

None of which I never actually met in person. 

If you are the only one on title and the only person that can sell it, you have leverage to threaten to sell the place and that contractor gets nothing.

Now I am realizing there are too many of them for me to personally execute on, but I also hate the idea of wasted opportunities.How does an experienced investors actually scale their operations besides just hiring VAs? 

Yes I have known it to work because the owner is not a push over, enforces policy and can make it run good......however, do you have the right personality to do this, AND if you move out can you continue to have the house run smoothly with no one in charge.  

In particular, now I make sure I can talk to the person who will be my direct contact at the company.

I personally couldnt return to lock the garage.

But, if a cost-seg study is done on the old property, you can manage Sec. 1245 recapture tax by doing a study on the new property to confirm it has as much or more Sec. 1245 property.You cannot swap a fully depreciated gas station for a raw piece of land and avoid recapture - you must replace all the 1245 and 1250 property.3) OZ - Sure you can defer your capital gains for a few years into an OZ fund, but the magic of OZ investments is the ability to achieve tax-exempt growth after a 10-year holding period.