These items are important so that you can budget accordingly and price the deal correctly.What size properties are you focusing on?

Make sure your listing is SEO optimized with the right keywords to attract more renters—many property management companies can help with this, along with tenant screening and payment management.

A few things important to our team would be a strong screening/application process, tenant and team communication capabilities, and digital key/gate access integration. 

Section 8 is a tool, not a cure-all.It can be a great program if you screen the tenants well. 

I have been looking into Legacy Homes.What size or type home did you buy?

The pitfalls are obviously bad neighborhoods (easy to gauge talking to brokers or running crime maps) and also find the right property manager depending on the size and class of the property. 

Maybe put some of that into a money market account or the stock market, so if an HVAC does go out in 2 months you can pull out $4-8k to replace it (depending on size, location, etc). 

The property includes a screened-in patio and an underground pool.

Screen them hard for your safety and for theirs. 

Make sure you screen well and hopefully they won't be.