Was able to refinance out of the FHA loan into a convention loan and then househack a 4 unit with another FHA loan while buying single families in the process.Now this year I've bought about 9 deals exclusively off market from my own direct mail and wholesalers with 2 more units under contract.

If you went the house hacking route, you would have the opportunity to take advantage of the primary residence exclusion if you have lived in the property for two out of the previous five years you've owned the property as your primary residence.

Just curious, do you have a regular bank - like a Chase or US Bank or a local bank in addition to Baselane or do you just use Baselane exclusively?

Our bookkeeping firm uses QBO exclusively for our clients (100% of our clients are REIs).

That helps with the defense and also demonstrates to the insurer that you didn't know about the fraud before your purchase because if you did, the exclusion from coverage for matters known to the insured and not disclosed to the insurer in writing before purchasing may come into play as does the exclusion for matters suffered, assumed or agreed to by the insured. 

In CA, “exclusive possession” is a term to understand.  

While your kids are too young to be employees, you could still set up investment or custodial accounts (like a UTMA or UGMA) and fund them with some of your after-tax rental income, which can grow tax-free until they’re adults.

How much is the owner occupied capital gains exclusion worth? 

It depends on how much of gain you are able to exclude.If the gain that you can exclude is like $50,000(Tax might be $10,000), then you might be indifferent in selling it / or keeping it.If your gain is $400,000 to $500,000, then that is a much bigger amount of tax that can be excluded and one that you wouldn't have to worry about if you did the section 121 exclusion.

So the $8000 buys you exclusive training, deal review and gets you into the "club."