This works reasonably well for many situations, but it can lead to issues when you happen to have a particularly wasteful tenant that uses excessive amounts of water and/or electricity.

is there a particular formula that takes all manner of factors, (employment growth, corporation development news, barrier to entry, rental rates, wage growth, etc) into account and spits out an "invest in city X" answer?

I will take a better look at Alabama for sure :) Any particular city that you suggest? 

I would strongly encourage you to shop around for other options for this particular scenario.

This is in Lexington KY which AI says have grown 5.1% YOY but the latest data I saw for this particular zip code is a year old and says it's the lowest in Lex with a median of $900/m so +5% only gets us to $945.

I'm particularly interested in short-term rentals and strategies to maximize cash flow and ROI.

Some examples of what I'm looking to connect on in no particular order. 

Was it simply experience, or were there particular resources that were helpful to you? 

Using a 1031 exchange to capitalize on better opportunities is a great strategy.Your point about avoiding over-leverage is particularly eye-opening—it's a reminder of how critical it is to balance leverage carefully.

Quote from @Shrikant Kakani: I'm not sure how you landed on those particular cities.