You also have sellers who are financially less literate and make knee-jerk decisions.To your point, off-market deals in B and C neighborhoods are often overpriced, because the owner felt that their house is worth more than what the 5 agents they asked for an opinion told them.

The other way he has fixed it was by literally calling the bank and telling them he's the one paying for it and the bank was fine with that.

I am literally out of the landlording game now, so I don't pay a lot of attention to the fundamentals.

There accountability system was totally lacking and, they did most everything via "talkie-talk" on the phone for literally everything, which is just a giant time-suck.

I have had to turn away people that were literally crying/begging on the phone as I turned them down and you feel terrible, but I have a responsibility to the Owner to manage the asset responsibly. 

Reach out any time- I'm literally the STR investment expert in the area.My clients are getting approximately $140k-150k gross annual revenue per $1M invested.

I can keep much tighter control on expenses by not getting ripped off by contractors or property managers and was able to negotiate a better, long term lease with a large international tenant because I knew there were literally no other options in my town. 

Literally got into RE while at a family BBQ about 15 years ago.

As he noted, if you call some of the mainstream custodians they will say they allow for self-direction but they mean that in the literal sense of doing what you want with the securities and investment options on their platforms, which are traditional investments like stocks, bonds, ETFs, etc.  

This is the simplest method, but it also means your tenants are more likely to abuse the utilities by leaving windows open with the heat or A/C running, leaving lights on, ignoring the toilet that constantly flushes on its own, etc.3.