My estimated basis, stepped up, is about 459K (that is 1/2 of my basis of 273.5K + 20K improvements and 1/2 the value at time of my husband's death of 585K) + 20K upgrades this year to sell.

At the moments, I'm looking at 2 properties both in California:-  First one is a beautiful, bigger home, completely high-end upgraded, in a higher value area with a good school district, and of course it comes with a higher cost to buy, rent can only cover the monthly expenses (mortgage, insurance, tax, etc), this one is expected to have higher appreciations in the long term.- Second one is a decent remodeled home, smaller, in a lower value area, I can get it without financing (pay cash), so it will cash flow (about $2200/moth after all expenses such as tax and insurance), it also has a potential for an ADU, but future appreciation is not as great as the first property due to location.

(Minor upgrades I could handle) I don't know any contractors at the moment.

I work with mobile home dealerships and many of their customers end upgrading to new homes while selling their used homes.

Their slide deck, 85 pages is on their website, They believe that they will increase the properties NOI by 45% over 5 yr hold, mostly through rent increases after doing 5K interior upgrades in all 252 units, thus adding 19 million to value of property.

@Ryan Runchey If you are planning to scale up in the future, then QBO is a good option and you can start with the lower tier subscription for a single property, you can upgrade later when you acquire more properties.

@Tyler FergusonStessa is free with a BP pro subscription if you feel like upgrading. 

This is due to the fact that we were only looking at properties that don't need big upgrades. as I agree to your point of just jumping in, we want to make sure we don't jump in and then get out to realize the loss we took on it. 

Purchase price: $375,000 Cash invested: $80,000 Sale price: $605,000 Bought above market rate, held on for 3 years and sold to take out gain for upgraded property.

You can also apply bonus depreciation to some additional upgrades to  your property.