The most effective ways to prepare for unforeseen (and seen) expenses:-Work with an investor-friendly agent that doesn't have "commission breath" and will push you to buy any property regardless of condition.

Qualifying on your own and moving properties into an LLC will have the same lending effect as if you just kept them in your personal name.  

The pricing is the easier of the two to fix and will have positive effect on algorithm placement as long as you also keep review average up.

She is one of the super sweet, soft-voice, always on your side (but will slice you if it gets her a better commission) realtors.

Please guide me towards an easy, effective system I can implement as I build my portfolio.

An LLC is likely a good tool, but how effective it is and how to use it depends on you.  

This is not new, people have been voicing your thoughts for a long time,.

You effectively hire an asset manager and they manage the property for you - the only thing you do after the wire is receive reports and distributions (hopefully!).  

There are some tools online that you can use to help "manage" you property, this is effective and cost efficient for portfolios less than 5 units.

This will effect their debt ratios etc.