You are essentially paying points to get a lower rate with this lender. 

If you are looking to lower property taxes you could try to argue your latest assessment with the county. 

Your travel expense stays lower that way. 

For the buyer, I would think the advantage would be in the $184k version since you have a lower down payment since there are both 5% down.

Monthly income (only rents) - 8500 (the listing seems to indicate only a single unit is currently occupied, and at below-market rate).Monthly expenses:property taxes: 1500 assuming this will be 1.2% of the deal value of 1.5M. current assessment is ~330k - https://www.sccassessor.org/index.php/all-situs-se...management: 850. thats 10% of rent, not taking into account placement feesvacancies: 425. this is assuming a 5% vacancy rate (may even be lower, market is hot) but doesnt take mgmt company placement fees.water & sewer: ~415. thats according to city sewer rates and avg water bill. no details in the listing. listing says this is not metered per-tenant.insurance: 375. zillow estimate.

Buckeye sounds really interesting especially since it looks like it’s backed by one of Bill Gate’s investment companies .http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-smart-city-pros-cons-arizona-urban-planners-2017-11Looks like they bought the land around $7500 acre .It makes sense more people are moving out of CA to Arizona and other lower cost lower taxed states .

I'm not too familiar with that, but what you're saying is (using Brokerage #2 for example with 50/50 split and lower monthly fees) that once they take X amount of your commission during the year, you would then get to keep 100% of all commission from that point on and they would take nothing besides their small monthly fee?

I believe Fannie or Freddie have a green development incentive that could lower financing fees.Good luck

We're considering buying an investment property (single family, duplex, or small apartment building) in greater Minnesota since the cost of properties is lower than in the twin cities.

The reason why I began there was the Mid-West  had all of the metrics that I was looking for i.e.. price to rent ratio, landlord friendly laws on the books and low cost of entry.