selling property after they appreciate

[Jason Schmidt]

I have been thinking about taking a while to purchase some smaller homes at $100k-125k, pay them off early and keep buying others just like that.

Then I got to thinking - if homes average 6% increases, then a 300,000 * 6% per year certainly would be a lot better than 100k * 6% a year. Even 3 homes @ 100k may not be as good because if you rent them, you would have to deal with 3 tenant families.

What is considered the wisest move here?

Finally, when selling (say I live in that 300k house for 3 years, and end up having 60k equity in it) the LAST thing I want to do is pay 6% ($300k + $60k appreciation * .06 = $21,600) to a realtor! That would take a MASSIVE chunk out of my profits. How are you all doing it? Or is my understanding of this whole thing waaaay off?