Welcome,I've been involved in the construction/trade aspects of RE for the past decade.Let me know if you experience issues getting the right guy for the job and I'll see what I can do.My RE experience and knowledge are limited, but my optimism isn't.Best of luck!

I would optimize these rentals for month-to-month (and longer) term rentals for professionals moving to the area or for those that want to do a work-live situation for a startup.I would love to know your thoughts and hear about any examples you know of that take a similar or related approach.Thanks again for the reply!

The trick is to determine these prices such that you will optimize your upside while still covering your downside and finding the buyer and/or seller who agrees.

Optimal on those is to get an interest only loan so the payments are real low while you inject capital into the property itself.

So welcome mistakes with optimism and when they come, learn quickly from it and get better.  

Like @Ryan Billingsley said, it is good to have an ideal figure of how you want the property to operate once leverage is applied, as this will dictate how much money you will need to leave into the project to make those numbers work.If you have held title to a property for 6 months, you can get a cash-out refinance through a Fannie/Freddie mortgage that will use 75% of the new appraised value of the property, and also provide you with 30/30 terms and a low interest rate in order to optimize cash flow.

The optimal time to buy in SoCal for this cycle was 2009-2012, so people jumping in today shouldn't expect the same stellar performance of the past few years until we are in recovery from some future recession, which could be many years from now.  

Also, from a SEO perspective, as you optimize your site for just that specific function and add gobs of content you will see an improvement in search rankings.Here's another way to look at it - let's say you need a plumber and you have the option of calling a plumber or a GC.  

A lax PM company, or owner, can encourage all kinds of behavior that isn't optimal for you - did they have preexisting leases?

I've bought some Nest appliances already and I'm also using ZeneHome to optimize my mortgage, insurance, prop taxes, etc but want to hear more about what tech others are using to cut costs at home?