Also realize that the amount you finance vs. cash you end up paying taxes on that amount.

What I learned long ago is that real estate investments can offer the following: positive cash flow, appreciation, and tax benefits.  

Same goes for number of LLCs and what to fund them with, since bear in mind that CA tends to be more cumbersome and expensive to have LLCs than other states.California is generally more cumbersome than other states when it comes to taxes and filings.

I called the county, and was told: (a) that "cove" doesn't meet the *current* definition of a bedroom, BUT for older MH, they go by what the manufacturer classified it as when it was sold; (b) the property tax listing for the lot identifies the MH as "personal property", so doesn't identify the number of bedrooms and baths; (c) the septic permit was made for a two bedroom residence.I have failed in my many attempts to locate any records as to how the manufacturer described this originally. 

Finding a legitimate reason is very simple.

If your not paying tax's not sure what additional write offs are going to do for U..

It was listing my team had that started out at $285,000 - price kept coming down so it interested me and I am building my passive income portfolio - this has cash flow of approx $1000 / mo after the mortgage and before taxes and insuranace.

my monthly income barely breaks even with taxes mortgage etc..any advice is appreciated. thanks

By being outside the city (the city line is a few blocks away), you save on city wage tax. 

I have not yet encountered a tax year where I've had to work through and claim income for flipping, but that is coming up in a couple months.