I believe the one benefits most besides the politicians are those low quality tenants that are hard on units, pay late, rough on the neighbors, etc.

I had a tenant force me to pay for some dumb azz air quality test where she claimed my air was bad and making her sick. 

At the time, his offer was low, and I had potential plans for that space, so I turned him down.

I've never really done a deep dive in analyzing the area because it is a retirement community, median income is very low, and there arent a lot of jobs in the area.

We are looking for low maintenance (so primarily new construction or >2000 and well maintained/rennovated) single family homes.

Consider a HELOC for value-added BRRRRs or flips if you have a low interest rate.

Looking for a house we could house hack, had an incredibly low interest rate on mortgage and house has increased in value about 42%, an estimated 180k in equity.

His credit score is fine but his income is showing too low to get the loan, so I though maybe I could use my HELOC to make the purchase and do a Lease to Own.

Not the case.Just like everything else, there are always different quality of Section 8 tenants.  

If before getting a permit you have to dance around for Code Dept officials/ city gov and crime is thru the roof, investments will definitely be low whether real estate or other, but it should be benefiting the city officials to keep things that way.