It's broken down by first time home buyer and consequent home buyers funding fee rates.

So , to the best of my determinantion and knowledge ,  the path I wish to travel as an fledgling real estate investor is to buy, again small and slow , manage, then sell ,  flip, or if not overly complex or risky, trade. 

New houses grow old with renters.. it will never look better to put on the market than now.The "wanting to get experience as a landlord for this type rental.. a SFH is marginal for just this one property" better to take a class at a landlord tenant association so your prepared more to do that in the future.Personally I'd sell if the tax guy thinks it's wise to do, otherwise the depreciation and losses you may have renting for the next few years might offset and keep it about a even trade off to sell later.

The old trading companies and merchant ventures were set up using limited liability investing.I have seen several lawsuits try to pierce the corporate veil of corporations and LLCs. 

Low risk, and, consequently, low or single digit yields.

There will certainly be tax consequences and other difficulties that do not exist with single member LLCs.

@John Hagen Devil's advocate here, if it's just $10K why not buy shares of a publicly traded REIT?  

I am a Web Developer / Software Engineer by trade, and have recently taken an interest in real estate.

I have good personal credit (780ish) and feel confident the interest rate spread between a FHA loan and private lender wouldn't be significant enough vs. the trade off of not being able to get my offer accepted because sellers do not like FHA loans.3) I have lived and rented in Oakland for two years now.

In fact, you need to register in EVERY state you do business.However, you can create an entity on one state and then Foreign File that name in another (Nev and Del are the usual for tax consequences).The filing for an entity is a one-sheet paper, and frequently it is online with the Secretary Of the State (it is for CA and Nev).