“Pets/animals” include, but is not limited to, both warm- and cold-blooded animals, such as dogs, cats, fish, rabbits, hamsters, rats, birds, snakes, lizards, and insects.Tenant agrees to pay immediately for any damage, loss, or expense caused by such pets/animals.

It's funny if you lose money irs wants you to be an investor so you can only write off 3k a year of your loss, but if you make money they want to classify you as a dealer. 

I suggest you immediately find a new tenant in order to mitigated your losses.

Said deposit to be used in the event of loss of or damage to the rented property and any accessories/equipment during the term of this Agreement, to defray fully or partially the cost of necessary repairs or replacement.  

Needless to say, this entails a quality manager.From what friends have said, a good property manager is worth their weight in gold. 

You won't be able to really create a list as loss can come from all sorts of angles.  

A tenant's son who smokes, which isn't great, might not financially be worth pursuing (a functioning cash-flow vs an expensive eviction case and loss of rent). 

We typically have paper losses thanks to depreciation, so no taxes.I think the bigger consideration is what do the hefty Texas taxes do to your cash flow: are you positive or negative at the end of the day in real cash terms.Be sure to protest your property taxes each year to try to keep the tax appraised value down. 

For my own properties, I am already at or near the maximum net passive loss allowance.

if I sell my house in 2016 and gain $500K, will I have to apply the $200K loss carry forward to offset the $500K first, meaning I will not enjoy the full $500K exclusion?