Since there's really not that much left on the lease and you have plenty of warning, you won't have a leg to stand on regarding damages from loss of rent.  

This only works if you have separate meters for the two floors for both the gas and electricity.I think this is a better way to go (for me at least) because you have no control on how the tenants use these utilities and could be capable of leaving lights,AC,TV's Heat etc. on for unnecessary periods of time which in the end could become a large variable cost.   

For a 6-family building in Providence, RI I'm paying 3.4% of purchase price in property taxes annually.  18% of my annual gross rents (before accounting for vacancy and other losses) go toward property taxes. 

If he gave you good advice and if the deals are good (I know you think they are but the real test is what you get them under contract for) then it is his loss not yours.  

In my tax bracket, it represents over $800 loss if I can't write off the expense.  

What if either goes bad.A bad turnkey and there are plenty out there as we know  if they go bad one generally loss's a portion of their investment or gets super frustrated with the performance or lack thereof because they invested in a high return HIgh risk TK environment..

You unfortunately will probably have to live with the lessons and the loss.

After three years of saving every penny I could, I made a mistake in the market and took a massive loss.

Also if one is reading Here PM STR "audited financial report", their actual profit loss statement is negative for all their 2022 properties, even in rural properties it is negative single digit cap rate (bought for 1.5 mil and rent for $400/night with 40% vacancy).

The pain of going through an eviction and facing potentially large losses and legal costs is far greater than a month of vacancy to wait for a better tenant.