I looked into this at more than one occasion, because Milwaukee has such an old housing stock, everything is 60-120 years old.Most of the new apartments we see are 4 and 5 star developments with very high rents, this allows to offset the high cost of construction a little better.

When an individual landlord prices their rental, they do based on what the other ones in the neighborhood have rented for. 

They don't tear things up, they don't party, rent is generally paid early, lots of positive attributes!!

I plan to live in the smallest unit and rent out the rest.

Best advice to you would be to use that VA loan as many times as you can and buy primary residences for a year, rent them out and then buy something else with the VA!

The fear of renting while out of town is common, but it's easy to overcome, especially when you have friends and a handyman.

Keep in mind taxes go up as do rents.

(Especially a 2-4 unit.)Do they have friends/relatives/co-workers that would rent rooms from them if they bought a property to show more income?

A client of mine in Maryland added smart home features to their rentals and boosted rents by 12% with minimal investment.

I am trying to calculate my returns over a 10-year period using the rent-by-room strategy, which results in significantly more cash flow than traditional rentals.