@Wesley Wong  on the West coast in the urban areas  SEA PDX SFO LA SD etc I always champion owning your own home first then go shopping.My home purchase's in the SF Bay Area over the years go without saying...

So do you want to play the urban sprawl game or go build where a couple thousand homeowners were displaced?

What it shows however, is that there is also a resurgence in the segment of the housing market that appeals to young professionals and others who seek an urban lifestyle, and live in the city by choice, not necessity.Disclaimer: Detroit is very much still a difficult market for the average investor.

We offered to drive him across town to the Humane Society and were prepared to pay the disposal fee for him.

This is especially true in the urban zip codes that most small folks are working in.  

Oh, and I have a master's in urban planning and I'm in the process of getting my master's in RE from UMD in College Park. 

Entity structuring is one of those often-overlooked areas of Real Estate Investing that can be kind of like the flu- you don't really give much thought to it until you get it (it, in the case of entity structuring, being a lawsuit), but once you have it- you can think of little else.Let's face it folks, we live in a litigious society.

However, I see moving the cost of dead beat tenants to the landlord as another symptom of our society divorcing individual consequences from individual actions.  

Not much going on there.Some of the desert communities outside of LA seem to do fairly well because of the urban sprawl. 

Just like buying a 30k rental in the URban core of virtually any big city no resale value and probably you are going to get a 30k education but with a lot more stress and sleepless nights than going to a Guru advance training seminar which are all up lifting and up beat at least while your there  :)The systemic issue is for whatever reason people think RE is the way to rich's  the way to quit your day job  etc etc.. and nothing can be farther from the truth..