Coffee is going to over personalize a situation where a person is MOST likely to use personal emotions against you.Late rent needs to be dealt with firm, fair, and expediently.

You're being outbid by either 1) other investors who are more focused on appreciation than cash flow or 2) retail buyers who are using way more emotion than fiscal analysis.Two things to consider:Look in other areas where there's a better relation between rents and price.Consider 5+ properties where the value is driven by income.

And last...avoid small coops as things can get very emotional...p.s - There are few coops which allow subletting from day 1 but they really hard to find...Came across some a while back in the UES and Inwood.Hope that help.

So you will definitely have to be patient and not let your emotions get the best of you.

Your post sounds like you're just focused on the emotions of it, which are totally understandable, but you're busy blaming everyone else.

Plus people criticize you and you place every day which gets emotionally tiring.There are not enough full service management companies doing a decent job.

Don't get emotional and overpay)Inspection (optional, but probably recommended)Renegotiate based on inspection - optionalClose

Some brokers actually have somewhat legit pro formas, with just a little biased tweaking, but you still want to verify those.Something that I've noticed lately, is that some properties that are over 4-units, which should be trading as commercial properties and valued based off of cap rates, are trading more like single-family homes and are valued based on comps and emotion.  

It's not THAT complicated, we just can't be emotional buyers that "want" a deal to work. 

I’ve used it before on primaries since there’s always an emotional factor that is hard to put a dollar figure on when you just want the perfect house that meets all your wife’s criteria, but for investment properties I usually just offer the highest I’m willing to pay if it’s a competitive situation, need to avoid the crab in a barrel syndrome and becoming the greater fool when it’s an investment.