My mental calculus is that I want returns in excess of 25% above what the passive S&P 500 Index has returned historically (~8%).  

California charges a minimum tax of $800 a year per LLC, and more if you have gross receipts in excess of $250k.

As for vTiger, I believe it’s free version is self-hosted, which means you need to have your own web hosting infrastructure and domain setup to take advantage of their open source option

It's not a line, it's a confusing (even for tax professionals) web of connected and contradicting rules.

No W-2 limits.There is an excess business loss limitation, but that's $578,000 for married filing joint taxpayers.

It may require paying down some balances and taking out authorized users 

In 2024, I'm trying to automate and delegate as much as possible.The big tasks I would like a VA to perform are:1) Web research2) Website creation & maintenance3) Social media content creation4) CRM work5) Newsletter research6) Market research

Given your current straightforward W-2 tax situation, a $5,000 annual fee for a real estate-focused CPA might be excessive. 

They also took $3,000 from my account yesterday without authorization.

. - unless you get some whacko judge, there should not be any issue collecting rent on unpermittted unit, having a move-out cost (no fault eviction) in excess of the standard rent control or eviction process in excess of standard rent control hurdles.