I also see grass roots investors in this arena.To note...being a electrical contractor & my personal investing are inextricably intertwined (my books are not lol) its just how the chips fell.As you probably know Bay Area tech is compressing which affects my "day job ".

Compound your investable assets to ~$1.8M, and it gets a lot more realistic...though compressing cap rates make it harder than it was last year.

And while the cap rates might compress even further this year in some markets, like Austin, it's hard to imagine how it will keep this up for another 5 years.

Our team never purchases with the intent to sell to a developer down the road at a compressed CAP Rate.

The ones that were available via an alarm company had good images and compression, but were out of my price range.

Any experienced USDA Rural Development Multifamily owners out there.I will try to keep this compressed; there are a lot of moving parts.

If you build in the outskirts, the sale price will be much lower, which compresses your profit.2) construction cost if you're doing the work yourself, you're close, but still off I believe. 3) Soft costs - you haven't included this in your estimate.  

But solid cash-flow properties are also difficult to come by anymore as a lot of dollars are chasing few investments and cap rates are getting compressed as a result.

Residential usually comes back first followed by apartment buildings and then the other asset classes of commercial.When caps start compressing and prices are no longer below replacement costs then some start shifting focus to building again and land development.

Mehran Kamari Check out this thread:http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/73472-replace-those-compression-valves-with-1-4-turn-angle-valvesIt's full of good info about plumbing valves.