In addition, if you can buy a property under market, or with an opportunity to add value (even if it's just paint and landscaping), you then have the ability to give your investing a boost when you either raise the rents because you have a higher class property and/or pull out some equity to invest in another property.  

Well DC and the higher income suburbs don't have as dramatic of swings.

It doesn't have to be a big confrontation... it doesn't have to be some dramatic talk...

dljoka-at-kw-dot-com , His name is Daniel, he works for Keller William in Medford, i dealt with him on a property ( i never bought it ) but he responds to you and was very helpful, this was last year i dealt with him and i have not talked to him since then. just check where you are buying there, values change dramatically from one block to the next in some areas.

The M-1 rail will provide a great boost to some areas and if you're willing to do a complete rehab, it might pay off.  

the biggest issues are that the available tenant base drops dramatically around October and doesn't pick up again till the end of the school year.People are no different than animals in that regard.They want to be settled and hunkered down in a property before the school year and/or bad weather starts.Quality tenants with good financial backgrounds don't want to move their families in the middle of an icy,snowy winter for obvious reasons,and good college students have already started school in August.Many of the few available tenants will have questionable backgrounds like recent job loss,previous eviction,bad credit,difficult income verification and don't make 3 times the rent,criminal records,etc.   

Northwest Indiana is only about 40 minutes from Chicago and the taxes are dramatically lower than Illinois.

Even forclosure auctions don't seem dramatically better.

Firstly, I expect your SAVINGS regime to increase dramatically!

Obviously the price point is dramatically lower than custom ordering to spec but if it's junk I'd rather not be burdened with replacing it again in the near future.Appreciate the feedback, thanks!