The cost of living is extremely low compared to other cities and you can still many many positive cash flowing and 1% deals here.

1st of all corporations own less than 2% of single family homes, they have actually reduced thier share of buying recently, now investors continue to buy up properties, it’s just more mom & pop types, all that said the housing market is in an extremely strange place, I could make strong arguments for prices pulling back, reaccelarting, or being basically flat, the biggest thing I’d advise is looking at you payment, comparing that to what would pay in rent, figuring out how long you plan to be the house and making an decision based on that, generally in that under 400k price point, breakeven for buying a property seems to about 3-5 years if you plan to stay in the house longer than that, bite the bullet & buy, if not rent.  

I encourage you to do a Google search/competitive analysis to learn what others charge LOCALLY (commission and fees) before you make a decision. 25% is extremely high for the Orlando market.

It’s a bit extreme, but I follow a similar rule (about 50% over and under rather than 100%)

syndications: very high risk, very high leverage, extremely low liquidity, almost zero control, too long investment too, and mild return compare to ETF/debt investment.There're two ways to make it work for syndication :- you invest as GP (sometimes there's this thing called co-GP fund so it's less risky in theory) ; invest as senior debt or just simply invest to the lender itself, some of these bridge lender (because of the structure) would go up in value when rate go up/down because all risk has been hedged.they make money even if the rate goes higher.

If anyone has a template or an example of a medium-term rental contract they could share, that would be extremely helpful.

Verifying last 2 years of rental history and income extremely important to find the “best of the worst”.Make sure you understand the Class of properties you are looking at and the corresponding results to expect.

(If you would like to track market expectations of rate changes, the FedWatch tool from the CME Group is extremely useful.)However, yields and mortgage rates can be greatly changed by Federal Reserve actions—the real drivers are the policy press releases and press conferences (typically scheduled for the early afternoon, a couple of hours after the publication of the decision).

It's a loophole, and it will eventually close, everywhere.Any property I buy going forward that I plan to hold long term I will only buy in areas that are already extremely strictly regulated for STRs. 

Be careful; the rules for qualifying for a real estate professional are extremely complex - it is an area of the tax code that many practitioners and even judges (tax court cases) have gotten wrong.