Typically  issues are raised when the exterior is not kept up with / parking on grass / garbage in neighborhoods where everyone takes pretty good care of their homes.If you keep it clean and run a tight ship, you should be okay most of the time.

You'll want to hire a licensed loan servicer to take care of that for you (Provident, Madison, FCI, etc).

I don't have any pending legal issues at the moment, but I've been thinking I should find a lawyer that I can go to for questions, to review documents, leases, etc so that I can have confidence that I'm not making any silly mistakes that will get me into trouble later on.

Not just location, but different states can have different (sometimes weird) rules like here in Texas where you need a manual third party "attorney review' on every loan doc set - adds about $100 to each doc cost that doesn't apply in most states

Investors typically won't care that you're representing the seller and others will prefer that you're direct to seller.Listing it on the MLS will get the most inquiries for the property.

As for the market, I would start by reviewing these two threads on KC.

Maintain a credit score of 620 or higher, save for a down payment, and research markets carefully.

I always say 'I don't care what cap rate I buy at, I care what cap rate I can turn it into'I built Market Analysis and Sales Comps tools for my local SoCal market that will let you analyze the current or terminal property & units, from wherever you get your deals from:Sales Comps & ARV estimate:Sales market analysis:Rental market analysis:Would love to discuss how to make your extension that much better!

One of the things you can start doing is reviewing your credit score and work on improving it if needed.

I am 100% against prenuptial agreements.If someone is concerned about losing their investments, they should be careful who they marry.