Once the lease is signed, I go to the bank and open a new security deposit account, and then the bank provides account number, which I then manually enter in the lease and have the tenant sign the lease again.Any guidance on avoiding the hassel of having to sing the lease twice lease?

The loans were varied and some were able to close sooner than others and they wanted to close before the others but we held out because we needed to close all of them at the same time to avoid any last minute standoffs or complications.

Signs of this are poor lease quality, maybe M2M tenants, high expenses (unnecessary things like high trash bills, internet, cleaning, security).

If you hired an agent or a broker to work with you, you'd be covered - but regulations & laws vary from place to place.Screening is best done by establishing a set of guidelines to qualify applicant tenants, then sticking to those rules to avoid legal issues (and for your own sanity).

He was trying to avoid increasing his annual income which was already high from his W2 job.Thanks!

What are some pros that I can highlight from the seller’s perspective.Here are a few that I’ve come up with:1) monthly income at a higher interest rate;2) avoiding a larger tax bill by reducing the purchase price (on paper);3) a promissory note that they could potentially sell down the road.Any other major ones I am missing?

And you avoid things like damaged properties (guest insurance from airbnb or prop manager themselves cover that), evictions, collections, etc.   

I wouldn't mess with your index funds if you can avoid it. 

That said, I completely understand your concern about deals looking "too good to be true" when you’re putting in 50% down.To avoid this, it’s best to analyze properties as if you were using more traditional financing (20-25% down).

I tried to set up quickbooks online, but without paying $720 a year for the ability to do class tracking, it seems like it wouldn't be as beneficial.I know there are other tools out there more geared towards real estate like xero, etc, but I'm still trying to avoid paying so much every month.Has anybody used realtyzam or rentalhero (rentalhero.io) they seem to be linked?