A living trust can be a great tool to not only let you dictate the future of your hard earned real estate portfolio while you are still alive but can help reduce estate taxes, ensure a step-up in basis of your properties to eliminate or reduce capital gains and avoid reassessment of your properties when you die so there won’t be a large increase in property taxes.Long story short, please go see an estate planning attorney!

As a lender that manages MI claims, I can tell you that, A) not all loans have MI and B) not all loans that do have MI have claims paid out on them after a loss and C) going back to what I said earlier where there is MI, all of the rules and processes and guidelines for a short sale are dictated by the MI issuer and NOT the lender.

The lay of the land really dictated the lot layout, wanted to do more lots but it just did not seem to be the thing to do back then

Aside from just property's zoning which dictates the quantity allowed, there are the other site requirements and restrictions.As far as efficiency, a small apartment building would likely be the most cost effective for the most units.

You dictate the terms.  

The operating agreement of the LLC will dictate the splits that you mentioned. 

@Zev Dobuler the distance between locations almost dictate multiple attorneys even within a national firm.

@Zasha SmithThe first question is that do you want to be passive or an active investor which is dictated by how much capital do you have to work with.

He wrote a report that sounded like it was dictated by the manager   (because it made reference  to things he couldn't possibly know). 

As a self proclaimed control freak I can't stomach investing heavily in stocks and letting outside forces dictate my wealth