Granted there is an extra 1.5% on the conventional, but the FHA has so many 'hidden' costs that make such a large difference. 1) Conventional loans (at least in my situation) - they will drop PMI payments once I hit 24 successful payments (2 years).

Work out a deal with this limited partner to contribute the extra post closing.

The idea was to have the rent cover the mortgage and some extra cash flow.

This will raise my premium an extra $1702.

Once an agent trusts a lender they know that lender can close deals (some lenders we will never work with and also listing agents really avoid certain lenders, such as Rocket mortgage)As far as working with you to increase your offer - same thing, this really doesn’t benefit your agent at all (the few extra pennies in commission 100% do not matter to an agent) Agent most likely does have insight of another offer and their reading the listing agent and situation and trying to coach you to make an offer to get the house.It’s hard to fully understand as a client who buys one or two houses a year.

Charlotte is enormous compared to Asheville.

@Ross Y. as @Jai Reddy said, with the extra info you provided in the second comment, that your wife qualifies for REPS, you can certainly use the extra losses from cost seg, beyond your rental income, to offset your W2 as well as the other active gains. 

I do not allow children in my STRs, nor do I allow pets....I see them both as extra work for me and potentially more damage to the property.

Point I'm getting to, is if you have the time, maybe pursue something on the side that demand your time and make extra money while continuing to educate yourself.

So with the extra money how would some of y’all get ur third property with 2 VA loans already in ur pocket.