That may be true; I suspect that the nosy neighbors in the complex next door might turn me in, and if not the parking enforcement might notice it in their next street sweeping ticket day.  

Not exactly formal mentorship like you're referring to, but a high ticket networking-type group which has a ton of successful real estate investors & other business people.

Chase bank where I have my accounts will hold the cashiers check for so many days before crediting it.I wouldn't let any tenant move in until payment was verified.Chase has told me they have even had social security checks bounce from the government.I am not joking...............On what you can do to collect you first have to get a judgment.The in most areas you can go for a bank levy or a wage garnishemnt.For the bank levy you cannot touch social security,pension,or retirement funds.If those are pulled out the money will be reversed back to their accounts and credited.On a wage garnishment you can only collect up to 25% of income from their check and that's if they make over the federal poverty guidelines.If they don't make over the guidelines you can't do squat.If they make over 25% that is the total that can be taken out period.So if 2 garnishments are before yours you get what is left over out of that 25%.Generally the people will not stay at the job and will move to an all cash job to avoid the garnishment or they will file BK.There are collection companies that will buy the debt from you outright for very cheap or you can have an arrangement where they get so much of a percent of whatever they collect and the rest is yours.You can set it and forget it and put your time to other uses.Judgments are easy to get and very hard and time consuming to collect.The moral of the story is to screen your tenants very wisely and make sure the money is in hand.When I sell stuff on Craigslist I only take cash and I have a pen to check the bills.Some might call that over the top but I have never been scammed.Just like my friend said I was paranoid always looking for cops so I wouldn't get a ticket.My driving record is perfect and he has 2 tickets in the last year jacking up his insurance rates.no legal advice

It doesn't give you the chance to save on a Southwest ticket but if that's the biggest problem you'll face then so be it.

Other big ticket items to consider: Flooring and bathroom/kitchen next.  

When the home inspection was done, there were big ticket items that needed work: needs new HVAC, new roof, excavate eroded and leaking sewer made of cast iron, install new sump pump.  

If the big ticket items need replacing in the next few years, you may need to negotiate the price.  

The owner claims to bring in $50k annually through selling parking tickets to amusement park customers.

@Eric Metz The problem is that one of the usual metrics to do a quick screen, the 50% rule, doesn't work on low rent properties. 50% of a low rent amount won't allow you to cover the big ticket items.

But in general even for such circumstances I would still keep the deposit and offer some sort of other gift (plane tickets, help paying for something) that is from you personally, not from your rental business.