While qualified dividends get preferential tax treatment, real estate offers:Depreciation deductions1031 exchangesCost segregation opportunitiesHome office deductions for your management activitiesAnd more!

. - PM provides a cash based accounting report every month, for every unit under management, that clearly labels all rent, all expenses, including management fees, and the net directly ties to the amount of money deposited into my bank account.- PM is a licensed handyman, or has them on staff, and takes care of most unit turn work at a reasonable rate. - PM has no breakup/termination fee- PM does not take project management fees, except on large or complicated CapEx projects exceeding $5,000. 

It varies by lender from what I've seen as to when they decide they will wait to close. 

Basically, the further you get away from the city the more potential for cashflow, but you're also dealing with a different tenant base that may be tougher to manage.

I has two GREAT property managers that immediately come to mind, one handling 5 high end high rise condos I owned in Phoenix and the other one handling a 12 unit very lower end apartment building I owned in Arlington, Texas.  

- If so, 1031 into something bigger and easier to manage and then when you pass, the inheritor receives your property(s) at a stepped up basis - subject to Inheritance Tax limits.Otherwise, sell one every 1-5 years when you need the cash, so you can plan expenses to offset capital gains.

I'm currently renting and when  decided I wanted to focus on real estate investing, I decided not to buy in Tampa because of the low MF inventory and in home house hacking is not for me.

Who gets to decide if a repair that appears to be needed is real or fictious, created to reduce the net available to the lender? 

Long distance investing/managing is an obvious for me since I move every couple years, but I retire from the Navy in 5-7 years, and I'll finally settle in one place. 

While I have managers handling the daily operations, I still oversee everything remotely.