So to sate my curiosity, I scoured the internet.Many questions posed throughout months of soul searching led me to asking this question: "If debt is so bad, why do the richest countries in the world have so much of it?" 

Sold his soul for a lousy $180k.

This is a tough one and you definitely need to do some critical thinking + soul searching. 

Interesting, we faced a very similar dilemma and after some soul searching decided to keep the home as a rental, put down less on the home we were purchasing and deal with the higher mortgage payment.We've been fortunate to experience significant appreciation, and as rates have lowered, we're now refinancing our primary and our mortgage will be roughly what it would have been had we sold the rental and put 20% down.Obviously we've benefitted from favorable trade winds over the last 18 months, but I strongly recommend keeping it.

I’d rather fix toilets and have to get my gonads kicked into my throat by these idiot tenants ...than make somebody else wealthy everyday for the next several decades at a soul sucking w2 job .

Business is an evil word, it means harm to me, it is the ultimate epitome of oppression and deception for greedy profit gained by stepping on and squashing every innocent soul in it's path. 

And that's why they go through life among the timid souls who never drink deep enough of life to know real victory nor real defeat.

Any kind souls out there willing to let me bounce it off them to see if I should pull the trigger.Thanks in advance, Andrew

(Be sure to factor PM costs into your numbers mentioned above.)Living next door to your tenants, when they know you are the owner and landlord, will corrode your soul and dissolve your brain from the inside out!

Would any willing soul out there - experienced w TD inv' ....share advice like Do's n Don'ts?