What is the " BEST" rental market?

[Codi Tripp]

I am looking at Tampa FLA, Houston TX, and South Carolina to start building a rental portfolio. My back ups are Memphis TN, Indianapolis IN, and Cleveland Ohio. I would just love to listen to any cheers or jeers of those areas, and maybe your favorite   

[Aaron Mazzrillo]

No such thing. The "best" market for you is the one you live in. It will beat all the others every day of the week. Especially the days when you discover that big capex like a roof being blow off (happened 2 years ago), some tweakers climbed up on the roof and gutted the A/C (did two of those in the last 12 months), an evap cooler leaked for so long that the drywall on the ceiling of the kids bedroom caved in (last year), the hot water heater blew a hose and a major leak went unnoticed for 10 hours flooding the hall, kitchen and living room (dealing with that now), the tenant smelled gas outside, the gas company came and shut off the gas because the underground pipe is corroded AND also discovered that the water heater is not venting properly so it got red tagged (just dealt with that last month) or the time the tenant "invited" a homeless guy over, he moved in, then called his other homeless buddy up and he parked his crappy RV with his entire family living in it in the driveway. Now I'm evicted the whole scummy bunch. Good times!

See, on those days, and they will happen, you'll pull out your handy Rolodex and look up the contractors (and lawyer) you have relationships with and get those jobs taken care of lickety split at a good price because you're a local with repeat business. You won't pay I need it now homeowner prices.

Or, you can buy out of state and get taken to the cleaners on almost every repair bill you pay for because you're the out-of-state rich dude buying up local property and nobody gives a dog turn on the sidewalk care about you. 

Up to you!