Early retirees are starved for yield, and it has a very detrimental impact on their lifestyle.

Protecting your family with proper insurance coverage is a critical component to your overall financial health.

Again it could be a reasonable cost depending on what all they had to do.There are multiple issues here.1.Most of the items mentioned for repair should have shown up on an inspection of the property PRIOR to purchasing.In my mind if you didn't get a inspection from a 3RD party inspector not affiliated with the company selling you the property then these repairs are on you for not doing due diligence.2.The other component is that this property manager has their own crew.I don't like that one but and would never agree to it.Sometimes managers also get referral fees for giving business to skilled trades even if they don't have their own crew.The problem becomes then instead of getting the best rate they have to pad it a little to give back to the property manager for the referral.So either way I am sure the property manager is reaping a benefit monetarily from it.This way they make more than the lousy 50 to 60 bucks a month managing a property.This is why I am not a fan of "one off houses" in an area far away from where I live.This is why I like owning apartment buildings.I can find a full time highly trained manager easily and they use systems and programs to control cost and everything is documented.Since they only focus on management and are not a broker/agent doing transactions and then handling "rentals on the side" my properties get the focus they need to be ran properly.It just sounds like you purchased wrong and then on top of that have a property manager padding fees with the repairs.REO agents used to do this with banks.They wouldn't make much commission on selling the little dumpy houses so would have their company do the trashout,re-key,repairs and charge full market for it.Eventually the banks caught on and choosed their own company to perform tasks and only let the broker list the property for sale.Sometimes that works and other times it doesn't as the broker or manager is now dealing with outside parties they can't control saying work was completed properly and it wasn't.If you haven't had an inspection of the property I would do it now to see what all else might come up in the future so you can expect it and plan for it.

Jake, notso random question: how long does it take you to run a comp on a house?

Our tax code encourages behavior that is detrimental to our country and it puts us at a disadvantage globally.

There are so many components that go into these calculations that the "devil is always in the detail".

A preferred return on your dollars invested SECOND (before the labor component gets one red cent)3.

Would a realtor be able to get comp on vacant lot sold, not far from the subject lot?

Real estate investing has always been a pivotal component of my long-term career plan, and I'm finally ready to take the plunge into my first deal.My goal is to have deal #1 in the books by the time I graduate in May.Thanks to everyone for sharing your stories, lessons, and experiences over the years.

The cash flow analysis is the easy part - the operations are pretty straightforward as well - but you've got to get a good grip on the components.