I am still on the hunt, I worry that people throw a lot of money at something and people get distracted as well. 

The South Perry Distract and along Garland are areas that seem to be experiencing appreciation.

Likeminded people will keep you away from distractions and encourage you to keep pushing even when things seem hard (and you will reach a point where things seem hard).

There's SO MUCH knowledge out there - a LOT of it is noise and distractions.

Distracted by what all the other investors are doing?

It always happens that when a deal needs attention it is the time you are most distracted and that is when mistakes happen.  

Sorry I was so distracted with other competing or attention.

Your response was a petty attempt to distract, deceive and distort the topic of the thread by citing inaccurate references you suggested you previously offered and gave irrelevant examples that had nothing to do with the topic of the thread or the post in which you were quoted.I responded by confirming my acknowledgement  of your general position of NOT using a POA, but (again) asked what made you advise the other BP friend to use one.  

In this day and age, the red-carpet treatment for divas starts in the 8/9 digit ball-park, short of that, it's just a distraction. 

I realize this may not be your situation, but perhaps something to consider.I also have some regrets with purchasing a place that required cosmetic work - I did this for the potential to add value and also to have slightly less competition from other buyers, but per the laws of nature it's ended up taking way more time and energy than I expected and distracted me from other things that are more important.In case it's useful to you, I've uploaded a spreadsheet i did to run numbers for my "live in, then rent" scenario (where i consider things like savings vs renting, what the outcome might look like after X years of living there and Y of renting, etc): https://www.biggerpockets.com/...Finally my top advice is probably to get more input from other folks in your area (you certainly don't want your only advice coming from your agent, where there's a conflict of interest!)