Are you implying that I should maintain two separate bank accounts - one for holding security deposit and the other for rental management expenses?

Look for neighborhoods with potential for rental income and growth.Financial Preparation: Given your reliance on loans and good credit score, continue maintaining and improving your credit score.

It costs $300 a year in MD to maintain an LLC. 

There are also additional costs of operating and maintaining an LLC, like separate bank accounts, annual report filings, tax filings, etc.2.

The obvious offset to that is that you can re-fi on the way down in order to maintain margins, I plan on doing that. 

If you find a cleaner to manage it life is easy but it's also difficult to maintain because you lose them to others that can provide more consistent work.  

You can maintain a hands-on approach or enlist professional management services to streamline operations and maximize efficiency.Strategies for SuccessLocation Matters: Focus on neighborhoods with low vacancy rates, good schools, access to amenities, and proximity to employment centers.

An attorney I listened to on Zoom call said he maintains a FB group that is a database of title companies across the country that are more investor ffriendly and especially more open to subto / creative finance deals.

The NC Secretary of State has what they call an eNotary, but "the process maintains the traditional safeguards of requiring the eNotary and the signer to be in the same physical location and for the identity of the signer to be verified by the eNotary." 

They will move to a different home where the owner keeps up on maintenance, and you'll be stuck trying to rent a non-functional home or paying a lot of money at once to fix everything back up.Best practice is to maintain your property.