Soon enough I will have access to 100% of my salary as a real estate agent to deploy towards future assets, working my way towards "Fat FI" and greater time freedom in my 40s & beyond.Lessons learned?

Leaky toilet, replace a burner, clogged sink, etc.

As you say, the landlord is always perceived as the villain of the piece, a fat cat who does nothing more than sit back, rake in 'all the money' and count it.

We supposedly live in a new, enlightened era, where people are not judged on their name, their color, their creed, being bald, fat, etc.

Current market is trimming the fat, see it as an opportunity to eat market share. 

It's a super useful tool to help trim fat in a business.No matter what your business is or what you invest in, it's likely that 20% of your products/clients/properties/etc generate 80% of your revenue.

I've got an electric glass-top stove in one of my units and only 3 out of 4 burners are working.

Those were fat years!

They'll hit you with fat fees on the front/back end, jack your rate up, and take advantage of borrowers who were either too stupid or too impatient to save up for a reasonable down payment themselves - and they want to be paid for taking the risk on (essentially - subprime) borrowers like this. 

We have had tenants that had 2 out of 4 burners not work on the stove.