I spent a lot of time and energy learning residential laws, common practices, apartment rental values, and anything else I can.

So at age 61 and 59, we finally spent a week on the Florida coast this year, and another week at Mackinac Island in Michigan.  

You can write off operating set up costs: legal, accounting, advertising, property management with clear invoices that are easy to pull out of a box in the event of an audit.

Kudos to you for outside the box thinking! 

I am the out-of-the-box thinker in my family and amongst those that are heirs to this land.

Something that looks like, I paid $x for a downpayment, took out a mortgage for x% interest for x years, spent x for rehab (if any), the NOI/CoC return/cash flow was $x/month (or per year) and this was a good deal because xyz.I hope this makes sense.

I thought it was something about 750 hours spent per year. 

I converted a few to propane because natural gas was not available at the street and I did not want to upgrade my electrical box to 200amp.

Again, if all the other boxes are checked, I would reanalyze and proceed forward if it makes sense to do so.

When any repairs or work are done, I take the invoice and classify it in my book keeping software Quick Books, so I can get an idea how much is being spent on each property and the overall performance of each property.