Recommendations for a good area for buy/hold in New Jersey where the math makes sense... any ideas? 

Make sense?  

Now if you and the LLC purchased the property as tenants in common (LLC 75% and you as 25%) then you would be living in a piece of real estate that you own and when it sold you could indeed take the portion that you owned and lived in tax free once you could establish that you had lived in the property fro 2 out of the previous 5 years prior to sale.

Makes sense, luckily our mortgage would be cheaper than our current rent.

(Their full package is over $1,000)  Makes absolutely no sense at all. 

Depending on taxable income of the LLC, your dad's other taxable income, projected growth of the business, and your dad's goals for the business, an election to have the LLC taxed as an S Corp or a C Corp might make sense now or in the future. 

which would make more sense?

Zillow says $125 rent increase equals a move and $50 increase is a common increase for tenants who stay.

To me, if you only have $10,000 AND you know as much about direct mail as you know about PPC (if you're brand new to both), it makes total sense to buy HIGH INTENT clicks.  

It does not make financial sense to bully tenants just becuase you can.