Looking for homes with good price/rent ratio in Lansing Michigan.

[James Dean-Howell]

This is a long one so I appreciate anyone that takes the time to answer!

My market is Lansing, Michigan.

I just watched a video on The silent killer that is CapEx and read a blog and the comment section on why 30k homes are bad for long term buy and hold rental strategy. The summary was that 30k properties generally couldn't produce rent high enough to sustain the cost of long term CapEx and maintenance. This isn't talking about a property you buy for 30k,fix up and make it a 80k property. Because in that scenario you actually bought an 80k property at a discount. This is talking about properties in markets that aren't likely to appreciate and when you buy them for 30k they are actually worth 30k. I don't want to bet on appreciation for my profits since I want to make my profits when I buy.

Given this I wanted to make sure that any property I look at with my realtor is going to be able to sustain as a rental property long term since I plan to hold it forever.

My realtor showed me a duplex yesterday that is listed for $38k. One side rents for $500, the other side that I'd be living in and eventually moving out of within a year, (house hacking/Nomad Strategy), rented for $450.

At $950 coming in, in a lower C class area, the rental income wouldn't be able to sustain the costs of owning the home long term when considering CapEx. Also this home is old. I can't remember the exact year but it's before 1950. Most homes In Lansing are.

I'll probably need something that will rent for at least $1100, if not more.

The problem is that I also want to have as low of a downpayment as possible with as low of a mortgage as possible so I can afford to put aside money for maintenance, management, and CapEx. So ideally I'd want to buy a cheap property that rents for a high amount.

What are ways I can search for that in my area? What characteristic of a property can I look for? Given that I'll be house hacking my realtor created a list that focused on duplexes but giving the cost of CapEx I can't really see duplexes within my price range, (below $115k), making enough rental income to sustain and cash flow positive long term. I'm talking 20 to 30 years down the line. I'd probably need each side to rent for 600, if not 650 just to be safe. So I was thinking of maybe focusing on Tri's and quad's instead of duplexes.

What do you think of that strategy? What criteria can I ask my agent to search for to have the best chance of finding a home I can get for cheap but will rent high? Would I only find that off market? Are there certain areas I should be looking at or avoiding? I've already asked my realtor a ton of questions and had  a few meetings with her. I want to make sure I'm as knowledge and prepared to give her the best way to help me find what I want. That's why I'm asking here so I'm making an efficient request to her because I value her time.

Thanks for your time!