@Keesha DuminieI would target something where by benefit of skills, relationships, or location, you are likely to out-perform the average expectation.For instance, someone that lives in a small university town is much more likely to out-perform and fix and flips there when compared to an out-of-state flipper.

We have 8% pref and plan to refinance into GSE on year 3. We return 50% of the capital to investors. Do we split this payout like any other cashflow? Let's say we have a cumulative 70/30 split. Let's say year 3 brings...

I was planning on incorporating my future real estate company to protect myself and have the tax benefits.

I like it as a team approach, I think that provides the value add, is set up purely to the customer’s benefit. 

I'm a bit confused, because we can't benefit from inflation in usual life but it seems like here we get a lot of reward from buildings' prices go up because of rent growth.

The legal limit for interest on a mortgage is 20%; therefore hard money lenders are well within their right to charge 10-15% in exchange for the risk they take and the benefits they provide.

I think you would benefit from reading Never Split The Difference by Chris Voss.  

The added benefit of this process is that you can also have your attorney sign the public records as "Nominee Trustee" before assigning yourself as the "Trustee" once the Trust has been established.

If you sell you will loose quite a bit in agent fees and you might never buy again in a prime location like Mountain View, You seem fairly young and have long investment horizon, if you are able to hold on to this long term you will most likely reap the benefits like its doing for @Maria D.   

My last HELOC (with PenFed) will adjust at the 10 year point, and become a regular amortizing second mortgage.