What do you think would be optimal for both parties?

And of course the traditional components of check in and check out, guest screening, and optimizing prices (though I find the most mgt companies don't do much there)

Google voice hack or another provider is fine, free would be optimal.

If you can finance using private lenders (friends, family, business contacts, co-workers, friends of friends, other contacts) on 10 year notes at 7-8% (20-30 year amort), then that would be optimal.

Depends on whether your analysis tells you that you are highly likely to net a financial positive (which is usually the case, in my experience) in a place that you will be happy living in.Fourth, with a high savings rate, no commute, a rapidly optimizing lifestyle, diminishing debts, and a growing pool of capital, you are going to go through a transition.

Very eye opening..The whole concept of "Why buy another property to increase cashflow by $100 when you haven't completely optimized your current building" is a great way to think. 

The biggest step I am taking to achieve this is optimizing existing relationships and building new ones.

That looks to me like optimism about the economy.Oregon usually gets recession deeper and longer lasting than the rest of the country.

I'm impressed with your optimism in CA multi family.

Stashing money in to property not leveraged sub-optimizes returns - sterilizing capital which could be better employed to produce more profits.