My goal is to have more financial freedom for myself and to provide a better future for my son.

Better yet, why haven't you hired a good PMC to handle all this BETTER than you can?

It’s better to build right now.  

Which route is better and what have you found that works best?

The east side of the state might be a better choice if you must.

Now I’m in Brandon Turners A Better Life Tribe which I’m having some technical issues with but after about 10 weeks of not being able to use the site they seem to have fixed it and I’ve been able to use different services associated with it all along so not a total loss.

If the borrower is very liquid and they are rate-conscious, typically borrower paid comp is a better option.

Based on what I’m reading (2% rule, 50% rule), and the cost of property management companies; it seems better to just sell it for its current value of $550k and invest the equity.

I’m consistently between the Seattle WA area (also very expensive) and the San Diego area but open to better markets for investing.

I suppose we could go back and fourth on the validity of your example of the rent / fight / murder, but for now the purpose of what I am saying here is if a customer isn't comfortable with the contract, their time is better spent moving on to a different PM than spending time and money trying to change their contract, cuz it ain't happening.