That said, it's nearly impossible to find a decent option under $300k in those locations.If you have an apetite for rolling the dice and saying "I'm so glad I bought this ten years ago!"

Do you know the 45 ways to get out of a real estate contract?

I'd keep an eye out for future development and path of progress plays.  

•Check their rep everywhere—Google, Facebook, BBB.

just double checked my lender is now 80% LTV for short term rentals only 85% for long term rentals

🫣This doesn’t answer your question directly, but the whole concept is very close to the old time “rooming house”.  

They should be able to teach you about asset risk, neighborhood risk, lay out A, B, C and D class areas, have stats on delinquency trends, vacancy trends, and other variable cost projections. 

With a bit of planning and good operations, one can easily manage 20 to 30 properties without an assistant, with less than a day or two a month.There's lots of automated ways to check on rent, make deposits (my tenants deposit directly into a bank account), receive maintenance requests, have maintenance done, etc., etc.One thing I could argue is to have your tenants ONLY email you, especially for maintenance requests, and that email goes directly to the vendor that you have set up to handle it.

This is tough for new investors that focus so hard on cash flow as their main criteria.

@Mark Lee, I appreciate that shout out from @Jake Andronico.