A really nice home with some extra touches (a little granite, better flooring, nicer paint job, nicer cabinets, etc.) compared to the area will make potential tenants fall in love with the place.  2) Tenants that bring or can swing their own appliances are more financially stable (or just stable in general, ha!)

You still have flooring, cabinets, bathrooms, plumbing, insulation, paint, etc, so all that cost remains the same it would seem. 

Paint, trim, full perimeter fencing, 2 gates and landscaping are starting.

There is no given answer here, because the whole property needs to be relatively consistent.Kitchens and baths are the common answer, but if they are passable and you choose to invest in them anyways at the expense of peeling paint (or off putting exterior color) and overgrown landscaping, the appraiser and tenant will be walking up with a bad taste in their mouth, thereby not valuing the interior work you have done.But think about the general flow of someone looking to rent: more bedrooms will typically dictate more rent.  

I breakdown my budgets by Category (Roofing, Siding, Painting, Electrical, etc.) 

And everyone wants to go to HD and buy Behr paint because consumer reports says it’s the best.

If you are just painting and replacing carpet, you still need to move into the home within 60 days of buying. 

I invested about $4000 in paint, tile, repairs etc to get it ready to be shown.

I started my OOS HML  career in Detroit and that was 2002 and WOW coming from our area what an education I got.. my clients that were doing turnkey at the time and all the buyers were out of state ( basically LA based) the local on the ground operator was very good he had all sorts of tricks to try to keep the houses safe.. the one i really liked was painting the copper pipes grey so thieves would not steal them..

Just the other day I saw someone had used black sheet rock screws in the hangers on a brand new deck (non-permitted obviously, and not a single lag or any flashing on the ledger board, and they painted it immediately before the pressure treated lumber had even dried out so that’s going to peal in the first year, at about the same time that those sheetrock screws start to rust lol).