Quote from @Cassidy Burns: Welcome to BP! 

I will get burned at some point but it has been good so far.

Let's view this another way, a tenant applies to rent who was convicted of burning down a previous landlords property.

Would stay away from TX - have a few friends that were burned on the Dallas and also Austin markets... 

The key is to understand the capital stack, who is in line in front of you and what are their terms.The people who are getting burned may have known there was debt in front of them, but did they know it was short term or variable - did they know all the details to make a good judgment on the investment.If a property had 20 year fixed debt at 70% would you take that over 3 year debt on a variable rate at 50%? 

But don’t worry they burn their employees just as badAs they’re investors.  

In the end someone who thought my tenant fully owned the property decided to burn it down for him.

Maybe it's burned to the ground.

Saika  While a permit is a hassle, what happens if there was a fire, it burned down, someone got killed and the fire department was not even aware the unpermitted structure existed.

Analyze well so you don’t get burned.