so I have come across investors that can live off their rental properties and then you some that are just happy with getting their mortgage paid off and have a little extra for repairs and maint. 

Your lease probably/should include a clause that tells you what type/kind of insurance you should/have to carry to live there.  

this actually happened with the obama administration years ago.these are what you are finding, troy. these houses are less than desirable and the bank, well frankly, " has bigger fish to fry". so these houses sit and sit and sit. get run down, and pretty soon, when the bank wakes up and realizes they have thousands of dollars in carrying costs invested in this house, they discover that they will never get anywhere near the amount that they have invested in the house back to them, so they " drop" the house. thats right, they write it off. they stop paying someone to check on it every 2 weeks, they stop paying someone to mow the lawn, etc. and they stop paying the taxes.my advice to you, call and ask the bank if they have " released the lien or mortgage" back to the original owner. some banks will tell you, others will not. then, call the local tax authority. ask how many years ago the last taxes were paid on the house and who paid them. if it was a bank, and they stopped paying the taxes, well, there is your first sign that the bank has dropped the house. they aren't going to keep paying the taxes on a house that they no longer want, are they?

Yes - passive losses carry forward year over year until you have a year where you do not have income as high or you sell.  

Market could go back to 2013 levels and if rents dropped way down too it might not cover the extra 200k debt service as well.Would it make sense to use the equity to pay off your other investment or does that make this much cash flow as well?

*shrug*By contrast folks actually residing here, that are here lawfully...Teach them how to hack FICO, they do exactly what they are told.Teach them to season funds, they do exactly what they are told.Teach them (or their CPA rather) what stuff we look for on Schedule E, make sure the rent and fair rental days are accurate, get aggressive with depreciation so no one is paying extra taxes for no reason, et cetera. 

Using your extra income does sound like a good idea, but just for a second, imagine this. 

You have extra cash that isn't getting a return, but you would like to put it to work.

We would think the lender would want them to come up with extra cash to cover the discrepancy between appraised price and their offer price, which could be as much as $25,000.  

I was in the construction business since I was 17 including those college years.Since I was in Texas and planned on staying there I found out that I was qualified to take a real estate broker license test without taking anything extra so I got a license, in 1980.