In Colorado Springs, for instance, the law requires that any vacation rental (excepting for a few pockets here and there) be your primary residence, but they do have a limited exception for military members deploying overseas.

Will the expected appreciation give you the return on the existing equity that is attractive to you or can you deploy that $510K somewhere else and get a better return?

You then look at what a $72K post-tax net return is relative to the initial amount of capital deployed and determine if that is a good enough return to justify the investment.

Because you can put in the work and just deploy your own system to get those leads directly yourself. 

I can say after trying multi level marketing, starting an automobile brokerage company, developing and deploying day trade systems, the easiest way to design the ideal life is through real estate.   

I had really gotten into trading on my second deployment but by then I was looking to move on from my military career.

- This ties into the previous question a bit, but we have around $70k that we could be comfortable deploying into this if we find the right deal. 

That way you could unlock the equity quickly and deploy it on your next project.

When rates re-trace and other folks start trying to deploy the capital, I want to know I secured the (right) asset.

I use it to quickly, easily, and cheaply deploy cash for investments, repairs, etc.