Construction disbursements are made based on lien waivers produced by labor and material releases showing both have been paid.

Whew, we just got rocked by ice!

My goals are to build a supplemental retirement income for my husband and I (we are a little bit behind) and to build an income producing career for myself so that my husband can pursue an alternative career and leave his $140000 yr job without much of a change in living standards.

(I believe once son's maxed out insurance he'd be eligible for medicaid & section 8 to pay rent on unit) Then use IRA to purchase income producing property, to further help?

Action will produce results, but you can't control what the responses will be to your actions.2nd thing...define your niche.  

Since I will need to pull from my equity in my one of my two properties to get my next one and this will be my first true "investment" property, I know I need to be rock solid on my facts with my wife.

Those drop like a rock in value as soon as you leave the lot and highly affect your DTI ratio getting a loan for investing.

I'm sure the details would have to be worked out, but that's where I would start.I disagree that all the "good" agents would leave the market, as I think those that are the best and most efficient would survive, and I think you would see the very low producers leave.To bring in another point that hasn't been discussed, listing agents do far less work (excluding the marketing) than even buyers agents.

Will that produce and equity increase of that amount, or more (i.e. will it then appraise out for more)?

My problem with @Bill Gulley's example is the broad stroke of C corps being a bad idea for holding income producing property you never intend to convert to personal use.