@Keith Miller: There are several I would recommend, and have summarized the list, (removed for outside link)

Choose real estate vs stocks is a matter of personal preference and can be summarized by whether you prefer higher returns on investment or high levels of passive investing. 

Angela, As you can probably tell, if I could summarize the thoughts of most( if not all) that have posted here it would be this.  

These “good” numbers must be compensating for some kind of pain that cannot be quantified on a spreadsheet.I would summarize it this way: If you can take the pain, the gains will come.

To summarize, how do we decide what is the better option....smaller town we'd love, or something slightly bigger. 

@Slocomb Reed, you can search numerous threads or Dodd Frank regulation, but what you will find can be summarized as followsDodd Frank Act, and administrative rulings by the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, are unbelievably numerous, hard to interpret, subject to subjective judgements, have harsh and draculon penalties for even small or inadvertent infractions, and cases are being pursued by trail attorneys both as individual cases and as part off class action.So, a lender set up to do a huge volume of personal mortgage loans may find the risk acceptable, the enormous investment in compliance and personnel  and procedures a cost of doing business.Private lenders do not have the time, money, staff or risk tolerance to be in this market. 

Here is a recent article that summarizes a few of those more recent findings including the Zillow one: https://www.energysage.com/solar/why-go-solar/increased-property-values/.

Most of my research about Milwaukee is done for my personal investing anyway, so I just summarize it for my YouTube subscribers.

@Jay Hinrichs all good points -- I think you've summarized my own hesitation in working with them.

He summarized it into broad categories on my taxes: Business Travel, Office Expense.