At the urging of gurus and even new investors who haven't yet gotten their feet wet, many people jump into the real estate game with no knowledge of state and federal laws, contracts, costs of operation, insurance, maintenance requirements, etc.

And almost 90% are owned by small operators.

Usually, a lawyer can help you with that when drafting your Operating Agreement. 

Feel free to visit our company website (in my signature below) if you want to get some idea of how we operate; we self-manage a reasonable amount of single-family homes (and occasionally apartments) through this website.

That's good to know that the tax advantages are generally the same whether you're operating by yourself or inside an LLC. 

So if you find one whose willing to operate in truth, honesty and integrity then they will not have a problem with the following (13) Rules of Engagement I have created when dealing with PMLs.1-I require that we transact all business using a local Title Company of my choosing, using their resources (i.e. title search etc), their loan servicing capabilities and an attorney of my choosing to draw up contracts. 

Being that your competition has the gate, it seems that is the standard to operate at.

For larger multifamily, this will typically be $200k - $500k+Lender will want to see net worth equal to the size of the loan and about 10% liquidity.Every lender is slightly different, but this is what I have seen in the 1000+ units we own and operate.

What kind of operation you running over there?!

You can write off operating set up costs: legal, accounting, advertising, property management with clear invoices that are easy to pull out of a box in the event of an audit.