@Caleb Genry I also can use that awesome Excel spreadsheet sir> 

You clearly found an excellent niche for yourself, hoping to do something similar myself.  

That said, Texas tends to offer more affordable housing than Florida’s coastal towns, so your money might go further if you’re buying properties for yourself and your portfolio.When it comes to family life, Texas has tons of family-friendly suburbs with excellent schools.

I may have to Teak my strategy in light of the excellent advice you provide here, Henry.  

Make the most of the excellent tools available on this platform.

These are what we call "A-class" markets—areas with strong fundamentals, high demand, and typically excellent long-term appreciation.

I’m looking to manage a few short-term rentals in the area and would love to hear from experienced hosts or managers about what it takes to excel in this space.Here are a few questions I’d love to get your thoughts on:What skills or qualities make a great property manager?

Don't solely rely on third-party management companies; instead, focus on building a solid asset management plan and, if needed, bring in experts or partners who excel in this field.

I'm not sure I can copy and paste my Excel spreadsheet, so i will approximate the numbers here.Strategy:Take a Home Equity Loan (second) on our primary @ 5%.Pay off existing HELOC (variable, at 7.5% now), use remainder ($120k) to buy the land (plus 30k of our own cash).

You could put in a range of numbers for purchase price and closing costs, renovation expenses, and expected returns and you could very quickly get a range of projected return on investments (although an excel spreadsheet could easily do this as well), but I'm sure as technology develops we will see even more sophistication in AI's ability to assist in deal analyzing.