This allowed me to control renovation costs, streamline operations, and accelerate my investment growth.

Insurance-  replacement costs.  

While using financing does mean I don’t keep 100% of the profit due to borrowing costs, it allows me to take on multiple projects at once and operate in higher price ranges than if I were only using my own capital. 

Take your sales price, minus selling costs, minus any capex, minus purchase price and that’s your taxable gain.

Funny enough, I was going to suggest you move out of SF due to the high cost ;-) I'd suggest going down the SF condo route to start as financing for commercial units is a lot more difficult than residential properties.

Same property listed water bill paid by landlord so how much does it cost to put individual meters for each property so cost can be moved to tenants? 

Assuming you sold the home at the end of 5 yearsYour NET ROI would be:0% appreciation: 10.93%1% appreciation: 12.13%2% appreciation: 13.33%3% appreciation: 14.53%This ROI calculation takes into account taxes, insurance, selling costs, repairs (calculated at $3500) through out the lease.

This is my personal opinion, which probably won't be popular.If you are worried about the cost of hiring an attorney to create a proper operating agreement for your LLC, you probably don't need an LLC, and if you choose to use an online site to create an LLC, you probably get the protection you paid for.

Many tenants will cut their nose off to spite their face and move, rather than accepting a fair increase:(What does Zillow say the rent should be?

The two deals with friends both ended poorly with friendships ruined and tens of thousands in legal fees and court costs.