There are lenders that will be willing to lend to you building your own home, but this will be a minority of lenders. 

There are plenty of funds for the rehab, but the bureaucracy is a nightmare to deal with.   

On many of our web sites there will also be calculators to help you determine what your tax liability would be.There are a number of folks like us right here on BP who are qualified intermediaries. 

Is there a particular website you suggest to further look into this? 

If you don't h ave any of those three or all of them to renovate, I prefer investor to buy rent-ready properties so there is no turnaround time other than getting it rented.

2. how sensitive the short term rental business is to these risks in these locations, i.e. there are not many properties for short term rental in certain locations for example?

Another caveat: there are a lot of STRs out there that are breaking HOA/local government/state/federal laws or strongly bending the rules, and I'm looking for people who did not do that or who mitigated risk there. 

If not, then it's probably a common thing there.

Located in NJ.Is there a way to refinance my rental property from my residential loan into an LLC?  

Growing business with networking is a wonderful opportunity, but with no experience in the RE space in the Triangle, I'd recommend you spend all of your time learning the market with this much runway.