It is easy to run the LTR numbers and decide off of that, but if I'm going after MTR, STR, student housing, or some other strategy to greatly boost cash flow, I'm curious how much of a difference the neighborhood makes and how to quantify that (again, not by LTR numbers).

How about your stress level when a tenant is getting emotional, how do you quantify stress or higher blood pressure?

Most want things like argus projections and heavy market data to quantify your vision.

As a qualitative criteria, yes, you want your properties to appreciate on some level, but I just don't think you can quantify it well enough to consider during underwriting/ROI analysis.Similar situation with tax benefits - we don't ultimately know what tax brackets will look like long term, and "tax reform" is a campaign talking point every election cycle. 

.#5 Practice, Practice, PracticeWalkthrough potential rehab properties (or find properties virtually online) and practice creating detailed scopes of work, quantifying repairs and estimating rehab costs for the projects.#6 Get Your First Rehab ProjectYou can practice all you want, but ultimately you will learn the most about estimating rehab costs by actually rehabbing a house.

Not sure how best to quantify that. 

Honest agents, property managers, and contractors will explain what could go wrong but it’s hard to quantify with a number.When you see 20% returns and someone explains verbally there is risk, it’s enticing to go after the 20% returns and ignore the risk because it’s not as quantifiable as all of the other calculations.

I think you have a great plan - it's a thorough vision with clear, quantifiable goals. 

There is just nothing similar about these two, so my suggestion is to go back and define your objectives and quantify them.

Lower returns reflect lower risk.Outside of return, don't really know how to quantify risk besides gut feel.