I know cheaper is not always better. 

Will another property come in better and may sell cheaper after you close?

At the beginning, it may be difficult to get a more expensive property that will appreciate well and so your choice is go with the cheaper property and get cash flow until you can sell and upgrade, or wait for a really good deal which you may be waiting for quite a while and its possible that you will have spent so much time waiting that you could have purchased multiple cash flowing properties by the time you get a good appreciation deal that you can qualify for / refinance after the rehab. i know anyone can go out and get seller financing deals, HML, flip to build capital or whatever the case may be I am just saying sometimes those will be harder and could result in less deals overall. 

Many newer investors have to start somewhere and older more-beat-up homes are cheaper and can help someone get their foot in the door.As for appreciation, this too is location dependent.

Some will be ok in 2nd position and some will not and force you to refinance out the first - but those are options that are probably cheaper than credit cards 

Yup and its a joke when you have these proclamations from those running for pres that they are going to magically accelerate construction.. they can do it if they want to pay 100% of it.. but if they expect the private sector that has to work through local zoning etc.. that aint happening and you cant force people to sell the land cheaper than they think its worth or can get on the open market just because we need starter housing.

Cheaper housing?

and soon realized that there was no aviable apartments in or around the same neighborhood for the price that they were looking for. if they wanted cheaper rent?

I'm also considering Halethorpe because it's a good commuter location.Some people really like supporting the city in which case , northeast Baltimore would seem to the best place to buy a single family, in my opinion given the taxes situation and given that none of those areas are walkable I’d rather just be in the county and pay Lower taxes, and it’s not like northeast Baltimore is much that much cheaper than Baltimore county, hathorpe is mixed, arbutus is nice, I hate the housing stock there, would rather be in Catonsville if I was considering western Baltimore county. 

The cost would be about 500k about $250k cheaper than it would be to buy another duplex property in my area.