To find reliable contractors, ask for recommendations from other investors, real estate agents, or your local hardware store, and check platforms like Angi or Thumbtack for reviews.It’s best to bring a contractor out after the inspection so you have all the details to discuss.

Is your DSCR ratio greater than 1-meaning are you cash flowing (according to the lender's criteria of mortgage, property taxes and insurance (and HOA) if applicable).

They are always leased here even for the corporate stations where they have a convenience store, a Popeyes or the like and a car wash.

If the applicant comes from the pool of people that I or my tenants know, I use real estate as a way to give back as many of my tenants will not qualify credit wise or may even have a criminal background or would struggle for another reason if I were to just stick to the "background/credit check" criteria. 

Nowadays, people can make paycheck stubs/W2's that look convincing so just make sure you invest in software that gathers verified information on applicants.  

How many applicants did you interview?

And, yes, there are years of data points to validate that just within my office, tens of thousands of dollars of wasted appraisal and inspection fees for deals (mostly not mine, thankfully) that had 0.00% of going anywhere but the "Loan Application Declined" bin. 

I know property managers in every state who use non-refundable application fees and it is the standard for every class of property and applicant.

And IMHO, the prices are dropping big time (on avg. 10K/month...houses that were above 300K a year ago are not selling at 250K now) and the available rentals saturation is worse than I seen during summer season (with rents dropping from 1$-1.08/sqft to 0.8$/sqft and very little contacts and applications...just go in Zillow and look how many rentals are on the market now in Kyle, New Braunfels or Converse). 

Assets identified in this study include:Standard windows and doorsInterior ceilings and wallsBasic plumbing and electrical systemsBuilding structural elementsBasic HVAC componentsThis engineering-based cost segregation study included the following methodology:Physical Inspection through a site visitDocumentation review including architectural plans, accounting records and construction documentsA cost analysis which utilizes engineering principles in order to allocate costs to their applicable asset classificationsCalculation of the depreciation schedule using MACRSAs a reminder, bonus depreciation started to phase out in 2023.