Since real estate has always been my secret fancy, here I am.But here's the deal--I know all too well I'm a flavor-of-the-month sort of guy.

Much of the information universal, but some of it has a distinct U.S.A. bias, particularly when it comes to finance, regulatory and taxation ... things are different here in Canada.  

@Katherine Earle  there you go you answered your own questions... you go there over see it protect your cash and hopefully you find the market fruitful.last little tid bit that most of us West coast investors learn the hard way.ARV and what a property will actually sell for to a home owner are two very distinct things.west coast properties sell within 1 to 2% of list or over list.properties in the mid west will have ARVs but offers will always come in at 10 to 20% under what your ask is and it can take a loooong time to get them sold and closed.. so be patient and be realistic.. make sure you can make a profit at 10% under ARV

We then focused our search on particular neighborhoods.Denton and Plano are distinctly different markets.

@Douglas Skipworth An important distinction.  

I apparently mentally discounted it as "pfft, this might as well not exist as distinct from vanilla Fannie," but if there's some niche where FNMA HR > FHLMC HP, I'd be curious to know what I've been overlooking. 

Underwriters are humans that evaluate risk for a living, and recognize that huge distinction. 

HI @Brodie Priestley, let me lead with this crucial distinction. . . .why do you need to reduce the price?   

With the development of private property ownership, real estate has become a major area of business, commonly referred to as commercial real estate.Purchasing real estate requires a significant investment,and peach parcel of land has unique characteristics, so the real estate industry has evolved into several distinct fields.

I recently saw a graph depicting historical S&P 500 trends right before and after elections and it was interesting to see the distinct difference in share value trends.