I think the market will pick up in 2025 as a whole but 2024 was a big dud. 

The city however did not pick up on this.

.-- Or, what we do is offer the free rent AFTER & ONLY if they pay their first 3 months of rent on time to earn it.4) Lower the rent 5% every 2-4 weeks until activity picks up.5) Understand this is the worst time of year to find tenants.-- Starts picking back up end of February when this tenant pool starts getting their income tax refunds and aren't broke anymore.6) Section 8: where is the property being advertised?

Seriously—Pick a Property TypeDetached houses might be the easiest to work with, but the real key is committing to a property type.

If you're targeting Section 8 tenants in Chicago, I'd suggest listing at the fair market rent of $2000.

Find the REIA group for your areaAs Henry noted, post something specific for your area and tag your market.Get on Loopnet for your area and property type, reach out to the brokers that are listing deals and offer to take to coffee (they are often invested in deals too but you could ask for connections to other operators that might be getting started).And, again as Henry noted, each person you meet, ask them what other networking events they have attended that you can put on your list.

I am currently 21 years old and was recently hired with my dream job in Sarasota County (I saw that Sarasota wasn’t an option so I picked the closest.)

If I had to leave a takeaway from this post before getting too far in it would be that whatever goals are had you have, we have these goals for a reason and typically it does not go exactly as planned but even if it doesn't go as planned, we can pick up where we left off and give it a fresh start.

I'm thinking I'll try out stressa and baselane for a week together and pick one.

Would love to pick your brain over dm.