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 ....

Install cameras and exterior lighting on timers, place no trespassing signs, and place items that indicate occupancy - like a BIG dog bowl near the front door, shoes, etc. 

Not a singe mail item sent yet.

On June 7th, we sent an itemized list of deductions via text; he responded on June 8th, disagreeing and threatening legal action.

Given the scope of your work, a simple plumbing leak would not concern me, it's a $200 issue at the most and ideally, it's just another line item when you do rough in plumbing for the kitchen.Being in a Milwaukee suburb, I am guessing it's a 1960s ranch, probably with galvanized plumbing.

Have the tenants take and send pictures of any maintenance items and video chat with the repair person as needed.If you ever get in a situation where you just feel like you can't do it or don't want to do it, you can always put a PM in place at any time. 

There are two items that you need to completely solve this problem for your rehabs: properly built Design Boards and a Finish Schedule.

If so, are you concerned about Spain's tax system on worldwide items?

Never use an Expense Ratio %-  do a line item forecast. 

I'm sure y'all already knew that!