Instead, he wrote a threatening letter (first contact since closing) and demanded thousands of dollars. 

Well if you ran realistic conservative numbers for maintenance, capex, vacancy rates, rental income, etc then you don't really need cash flow do you?

In 1972 the 30 year mortgage interest rate was 7%.

Attitude and professionalism are paramount; product knowledge next, and then there's your contact/follow-up systems.Put that together, price-test against the market, and you'll have a sustainable, constantly expanding, and very profitable venture.Good luck! 

I don’t really have an interest in House hacking if long-term rates are $700 a month incl utilities for a bedroom. 

You should be able to get up to 80% LTV on a rate term refinance.

Dont chase yield and don’t try brrs until have owned a few with tested contacts for labor. 

With current interest rates, and they are at least 1% higher with potentially additional points for non owner occupied property, it is hard to find properties that will allow for positive cash flow after paying the mortgage, if you are looking for money for the down payment from a private lender, those are normally at higher than market and I am not sure it would be possible to pay it off.... please remember you need to take into account that you may not have a tenant for a certain amount of time, a tenant may stop paying rent, or you will have a big ticket item to fix, so I would wait if I were you and save to have enough for the down payment and closing costs and perhaps some money set aside for repairs. you also want to make sure that you have your own emergency fund outside of the money needed for the investment property because life happens ....

Quote from @Scott Mac: It might be the investing environment.Right now we have a different interest rate picture then we had a few years ago.

Promises near 30% ROIs in RADD and above market rates for REIT?