I invest in B areas, particularly Riverwest here in Milwaukee, and if you get good systems in place like cozy.co where you do an ACH transer from the tenants account to yours (which is free) so you are never chasing tenants around for rent and also set up a google voice account where you can set "business hours" for receiving calls (I only receive calls between 9 - 5 on weekdays and none on weekends otherwise it goes straight to voicemail and sends me a text of what the tenant left a message about if it truly is an emergency) managing is not a huge strain on time. 

Tighten up your shot group with the spelling/grammar and you may see a vast increase in the amount of responses you receive. 

Tighten up your lease and leasing skills, document, document, document, make sure you have required move-in sheets signed with all new leases, and move on with a better quality tenant.

I originally had set it up to do currency trading (dad's idea) but regulations tightened during the long process of setting it all up, and then I didn't qualify.

I think the most likely events that will trigger a downward spiral are a recession and/or a faster paced Fed tightening of the money supply.

It's certainly doable, but other parts of the story strain my credulity, like where it says "Henkel kept acquiring new properties near campus.

@Carlo Torres Lending guidelines tighten when that happens.

Some of the fixes that they may suggest will actually cost no money, but a few minutes tightening this or that.  

Some of them are very minor such as tightening an outlet that has come lose which is a 5 minute fix.  

@Ade Amuda As others have said you need to tighten up your numbers significantly.