. $1,100 - where does this land in terms of your city.

.-  In terms of how much people should be spending per year on living expenses, I don't see how you can generalize that. 

The benefits of this house over that are 1) its a SFH rather than a duplex, so you aren't sharing a building/driveway with another family, 2) this house is a good chunk bigger in terms of SF, 3) the duplex has 2 outdoor parking spots, this has an attached 2 car garage, 4) the duplex has no real yard but the SFH has a nice sized fenced in back yard, 5) less traffic at night on the street (but still these are both on busy 4 lane streets).I'm assuming 1800 because I think that's a safe bet.  

In terms of learning, I second listening to the BP podcast.

In terms of investing by combining with spouse, I think the following structure would work and still provide flexibility, but curious whether anyone has any thoughts.E.g.

I have done detailed SOWs on my flips and have maintained positive control of my costs.From your description of the property it sounds to me that you may be underestimating how much work needs to be done, in terms of cost.

How about instead of asking in terms of a %, how much do you all aim to net on an average flip?

Compare apples to apples by seeing what the furnace guys offer in terms of size and BTUs and all that stuff and then check out the big box stores to see who has the best price.

I was thinking about it in terms of the probability of default, rather than the consequences of default.

In terms of the lease, is the tenant a somewhat normal person who has a job etc?