The rental half is essentially half the property, so worth $500k.

Thanks Scott I got a nice mention this week on Dave Meyers post about RE asset class. and one of the BP members a few years ago sent me a nice e mail and we talked through a deal he was doing and he gave me some credit for helping him structure and or giving him encouragement to go for it.. and I believe he said this year that one deal netted him 143k in cash flow.. talk about a Yatchzee..

You are hoping for a lot with good appreciation and decent cash flow, but paying cash can get that done for sure.

I need to pull out cash to perform maintenance on the same property.

This is good - let the market work without government intervention, and without the NAR withholding every detail about a house and essentially lobbying to maintain 90% of this career field

what I'm telling people about hilltop is the only reason it's going up is because of the average housing price in columbus being pushed and the lack of inventory. when I started I'd have bought here too. if I was going to invest here I'd look at houses built after 1947 without knob and tube wiring, etc. the old housing is the problem. we are building now in downtown adjacent. land is a buyer's market and it's much less competitive and easy to get the numbers to work. there is very little construction in 43204 and I've transitioned to new construction triplex now with entitlement and larger multifamily projects feel free to message or call anytime. personally, l like new construction in 43203, 43205, 43206, 43223, 43222 right now and obviously 43215 which you have to have at least 600k in cash to get the land to entitle and want to build at least 100 units to make it worth it. 

I will be putting anywhere from 3.5%-5% down on the property so with that in mind, would y'all recommend starting with a Multi Family and reduce my living expense or with the SFH and not cash flow until year 2 when I am out of the property? 

Otherwise they’re essentially the same on owning real estate. 

Meanwhile prices continue to increase making the cash to invest greater to break even.

Essentially, you would only really need to appoint an attorney once you acquire a lien (at least that's the case with the attorney I communicated with).