A good agency will eat 20-30% of gross but it'll be booked, cleaned and turned much more than if you do it solo.

That meant buying materials needed for that night during my lunch hour, and eating dinner in the car on the way to the rental. 

no smoking, drinking, eating out, and very little entertainment for her.

She won't do selling-financing, tenant doesn't have the funds purchase, starting asking friends/family to see if they want to be passive investors but have not had any luck yet, I have a HML I work with but need ~$50k down and points eat into the profits on such a smaller spread. 

I don't like borrowing too much and eating up my cash flow

However, the closing costs might "eat up" the difference.  

You'll pocket a bit each month, but when you have an expense or vacancy it will eat that up.

Well, they are once you get 20+ units but if you're starting with 1 SFR or 1 duplex you have to factor in how much those plane tickets will eat into your "$100/month cash-flow" (just to pick a random metric some people use here on BP).

Why not just eat the taxes?

A war zone may promise high returns. however if you cannot keep good tenants and have high turnover costs that will eat into your returns.