I also live in Tomball and have a similar need for a CPA with heavy RE / investment income experience.Matthew

So basically the application downloads my credit card and rental bank account transactions once a week automatically, then I take 5 minutes to tag each transaction with the matching property and then categorize with the expense/ income type.

@Matt LeberYou're mixing together two completely unrelated taxes: IRS income taxes and local property taxes.

Any tax benefit for havingnegative cash flow i.e let say you have rentals with +ve cash flow that add the total income and for me i already have w2 so that extra +ve cash flow make me pay more to uncle SAM (which i don't mind as such, Uncle SAM can use that to fix the roads i travel) will -ve cash flow properties will negete the +ve cash flow with a long term goal that at some point the -ve cash flow will become +ve and i pay uncle SAM more to fix the road due to rain. is that your thinking too :)

My primary focus for this investment is on long-term appreciation potential and leveraging rental income to pay down the mortgage, in this case I have no cashflow.Given the current market conditions, I understand that cash flow might not be immediate, but I'm more interested in the potential for appreciation over time and the ability to offset expenses through rental income.

The insights we've gained has fueled our passion and desire to make a positive impact in the real estate industry.At present, our focus is on building a portfolio of buy and hold rental properties to generate passive income.

You can use Heloc money for a down payment on investment property, but this loan will factor into your debt to income ratio. 

This was done to protect senior citizens on fixed incomes from being forced to sell their homes due to unaffordable property tax increases.Since the passing of this amendment, all properties in Michigan have two property tax values associated with them:State Equalized Value (SEV): supposedly equal to 50% of the market value of a property, not based on recent sales price.Taxable Value: the SEV annually capped as long as there is not a transfer of ownership.City Assessors are charged with determining how much property values have changed each year.

Lenders will use your tax returns schedule E to calculate your monthly rental income.

My theory is that not too many people want to buy them - the people living in those areas don't have a high enough income, credit score etc to purchase at 7% interest rates and it's investors who have a high risk tolerance who will buy them (like me and I don't have a high risk tolerance, just made a bad decision).