If the area warrants an alarm, having them in, in the first place is a bonus/selling point for tenants..

Since it would seem that the 2 units are "in operation," you would depreciate the reno or take the available bonus depreciation deduction.Usually, its not advisable to hold your residence in a LLC. 

We will renovate the fix up the first floor additional dwelling and plan to rent it out as a STR for the rest of 1st year to maximize the return of our renovation expense against our W2 taxes via the Cost Seg / Bonus Depreciation.

From what I understand the people like David Green just consider the mortgage paydown as a bonus.

Cleveland and subs has great cashflow with good appreciation as a bonus.

If the agent has some kind of mailing list where they send out off-market deals to, that would be a bonus. 

I doubt you will have tenants that stay on for years .. and agents or PMs are going to charge you to do that.. with 2k or so a year in your blue sky proforma.. i suspect in reality this will be break even to a little bit of negative.. and you big bonus will be your tenant paying your place off for you ( which is just fine in my book to me cash flow is icing on the cake its all about getting that debt paid down with someone elses dollar. and of course the little bit of tax shelter.. also I can see how your prop tax's are only 1600.. thats 05%  that seems really low.But I do wish U the best with these.. it looks like a solid place though.

Also why you need to think about bonus expenses, cost segregation, etc on the front end. 

Now I just got a good amount of back pay and about to get a bonus from my job.

Great idea about the amenities....the house is only 750 sq ft but there is a bonus room where we can turn into a little game room with a murphy bed.