More regarding the long term water outlook in California:"The Water Replenishment District of Southern California, which manages groundwater for parts of the region, has set a goal to wean itself off imported water altogether by treating and recycling wastewater and collecting more stormwater."

, replenish your HELOC, and have acquired a cash flowing duplex for zero down.

Now washers and dryers are a different story.In terms of repairs... if a tenants damages the appliances, you would deduct the cost of the repair from their security deposit and have them replenish the deposit during their lease.

Then when you have fixed up the distressed and under-valued property, and yes that is what you ill need to buy, you wither do a cash out refi on the hold and replenish the HELOC or flip it and replenish the HELOC. 

What I want to do is use my mutual funds to purchase a property and replenish the mutual fund with the 50k to make interest, while paying back my mom with no interest.Does anyone have experience with gift taxing? 

To be honest, I end up using this pool to pull from when buying investments and then replenish as necesssary.

The dilemma is we can definitely afford to finance it but we are at a point where we need to replenish our ammunition.

Replenish the account and factor in capital improvements, turnover, etc..Your father will have to file a gift tax return if the gift was over 14k each.  

When the bomb dropped, it cost you money and time (which cannot be replenished) to find another tenant.

Of course my operating agreement and requires me to replenish these accounts if ever used.