If the same person is willing to cut it down for free in exchange for the wood, I'd let them do it.

I would invest into the furnishings and spending time marketing to try and get quality tenants in place.Let me know what you think of this strategy, anything and everything is welcome for advice or stories of your experiences in this arena. - JD 

Low priced houses, low quality tenants, low quality property managers, low quality contractors. 

Every room has a few pieces of furniture/personal belongings.

I’m finally ready to take the plunge into real estate investing, but with two kids, I’m nervous to use any of my own cash for the first project. Any tips on how to navigate this?

Hello all. Hope I can learn some good information on here.

That is MUCH harder to do from a distance and when your personal experience may be with newer homes that don't have issues like this.

we build ground up and don't collateralize anything. we build at a discount in Columbus Ohio and we build cheaper than every builder I've seen in our market and because of that we make each person self fund a retainer account. we don't extend any credit to anyone. opposite of what you are saying. builders that bring value call the shots. 

The IRS has a “same taxpayer” requirement for tax tracking – if the same person or entity is exchanging, it’s easy.If not, we’ll have to bring in our structuring attorney to ensure the right steps are taken to maintain 1031 eligibility.

I have asked if someone is teaching this offer structure and one person said it's common in land and the other explained it as a win-win situation.