Before selling at a loss, I’d also explore small levers like HOA-rules-permitting midterm rentals, employer housing, or optimizing lease terms to push rent slightly higher.

Proactive tax planning helps you leverage deductions, choose optimal structures, and keep more of what you earn.

Aim for roughly a 10–20% increase in ARV through high-ROI items like kitchen and bath refreshes, flooring, paint, fixtures, curb appeal, and rent optimization.

The right choice depends on what you’re optimizing for.

A mediocre deal with strong management will usually outperform a great deal with weak execution.One suggestion given your profile would be to start with something simple and boring rather than trying to optimize returns on the first deal.

.- in general OO SFH are purchased to be good homes for the purchaser and not optimal rentals.  

Tax strategy is where the tax optimization should occur.

The win is what happens after rent growth, refi, or ops optimization — not month one.Cash flow ≠ deal quality.Plenty of solid SubTo deals start at breakeven or slightly negative and turn into monsters over 12–36 months.

Your first investment should optimize for learning and downside protection.

Without that, you're just a ticking time bomb for getting stretched.The real harvest phase is optimizing the taxes to take your real monthly/quarterly/annual profit and have it re-invested in another asset and still showing a tax reduction or deduction.