Love the airport there flying in over the bay... there is an instrument approach that takes you over the spit and turns you back in.. and the burgers at the restaurant are nice.

The 70% rule really doesn't help much if you are using a buy and hold strategy, with the exception that you know you can have a second exit strategy by selling and still make a profit if you needed to sell.  

But Mike, seriously, how can you eat that stuff :) In and Out burger is the only way to go.

A couple rules I set up for myself.1. 1% rule, rent needs to be at least 1% of purchase price2. with little to no profit I should be able to pay monthly expenses with half of the estimated rent 3.

They also have resteraunt coupons, taco bell, culvers, burger king, ect... they run like 2 dollars and let you purchase any value meal for free.

Finding a 1% ruler will be very tough.

But applying the 50% rule will serve new investors FAR, FAR better than the phony cash flow lie.If an investor applies that rule, realizes they will have negative cash flow and chooses to invest anyway for purposes of speculation (which is in part what you're advocating, and is a perfectly acceptable strategy) then I have zero problem with them. 

If you work at McDonalds flipping burgers or at IBM writing code, you're working, and getting paid to work.

If someone gets injured on your property, paid by cash, check, or McDonalds burgers, it does NOT matter, they can and will sue you.

In a market like southern California where the cap rates are for the most part under 5% it has been very difficult for me to find any type of MF property that meets the 1% rule (rents being at least 1% of purchase price).Should I just keep looking until I find the needle in the haystack or are there other criteria that is more important when trying to invest in a cash flowing buy and hold investment property?