@Garreton SmithHi Garreton,Walking distance services and stores the intended residents will like.Such as certain fast foods, liquor stores, grocery store, convenience stores, medical services, nothing too upscale/unaffordable.Good Lighting at night on the street vs. where the street lights get shot out by the local criminal element so they can sell drugs in darkness.Good Luck! 

We bought a duplex in what people refer to as "the bottoms" our next door neighbors are drug dealers along with a few others on the block. 😅 But it's honestly not bad at all.

Also as a real estate investor you don't always know who is answering that door I've been through houses where the owners had no problem leaving all their drugs and paraphernalia out in the open, some people are a bit out there to say the least, I would personally advise against it.   

We selected "no" because the application specifically mentioned violent and drug-related crimes, but apparently we answered incorrectly.

Too much crime, blight, and open air drug markets that 99% of investors want no part of.  

However, if there is any credit history of rent payment issues, it's a pass.We also have a zero tolerance for repeated drug history or domestic violence on a background check.

Investing in real estate seems like my chance to not only alleviate some of my financial stress, but to begin forming a potentially lucrative career!

the 2nd association it resonates is the highly consumption-driven society we live in. in my area (coastal, urban southern california) i'm surrounded by 2 distinct lifestyles. there's the majority: seems like 95% of the local population who are renters, driving luxury cars, sporting fancy clothes, jewelry, hairdos, etc but obviously living paycheck to paycheck as exemplified by hardly a day somebody or the other is spotted  getting their car repo'ed by a camera crew. the rarer are the landlords, who in this area seem to be of mostly asian demographics (chinese, koreans, japanese) who live obviously very frugally: old 80s model sedan, oldfashion business cloths, always eating simple meal from home, seemingly never splurging $$$ other than into expanding their portfolio), my observance is relatively very few landlords in the area own relatively huge portfolios, each.with the advent of these infomercials and the internet (ie, BP) more and more people want to get a 'piece of the REI pie' and more power to them. there does seem to be this dream of rags to riches and while its ok to dream, do most people actually expect their life to turn around like that, as portrayed in most of the infomercials or even in the everyday setting where the masses living paycheck to paycheck, are spending their last expendable dollars not on depositing into savings acount, but blowing $20 on scratchies etc. in summary, is my observation reminds me of my days when i worked on wall st and the 'ra trace' was so obvious with dime a dozen stock brokers makin 6fig salaries at some point but blowing it on recreational drugs apparently costing thousands of dollars a pop to the point the next week they are broke again and that $ wasnt invested but wasted.  

There is always the possibility that the property can be seized by the authorities and will be auctioned off by them because of the drug connection.

Check out BP Podcast 110 to alleviate your landlording concerns!