Try doing the math to see if you would cash flow(have excess money left over from rent after paying the mortgage and your other expenses from the house) on the property with the market value rent.You mentioned needing to do the roof and gutters in a few years. 

Carpet needs to be replaced more often with greater chances of getting stains or excess dirt build up.

That seems like the way to go, but it seems a bit excessive. 

This, coupled with a reduction on the price of the property given to us by the seller and the passage of about a year leaves us with needing only a few hundred thousand dollars when we finally closed a few months ago.Being left with over $2M on the loan, we've been making rather large payments to get rid of the amount in excess of what we need.

I have a duplex  that my two tenants share the utilities charges.  One tenant with the larger unit pays 2/3 of electric, gas and water.  The other tenant pays the 1/3,  During the summer, the electric bill was almost ...

Lot of great things that may apply to you with your excess land.

Lots of fat and middlemen getting that way. 

We don't concern ourselves with them, we care about the excess making us money.

There can be one item that will take 5 minutes to fix, and we will gladly leave the final payment (which can be in excess of $20,000) outstanding until it has been remedied.What I emphasize to all of our potential clients is that the client/contractor relationship is very intimate.

This is investing, whereupon one using their "excess" resources (income, existing capital, credit) to make more "wealth."