It always a good idea to try to sort out the problems you are having with existing professionals first.

There are tons of ethical wholesalers in your home state, who post in some sort of non specific NJ RE investor Facebook group, who definitely do not daisy chain their deals, inflate ARV's or just post crap that's literally on the MLS.

Verifying last 2 years of rental history and income extremely important to find the “best of the worst”.Make sure you understand the Class of properties you are looking at and the corresponding results to expect.

The very first thing you should do before getting into any sort of real estate investing is to learn your local market.

Typically, when I work with RE investors, we'd make a preliminary legal plan to ensure that both the legal and business goals align before creating any sort of entity set-up.

, and the absolute worst thing is the fact that I found out they charge their management fee whether the tenant pays or not!!!

There are some institutions that allow you to use both W2s and Bank Statements to qualify if you hold a side business of some sort. 

An investor friendly agent can do all sorts of helpful things, like setting you up with a search for properties or connecting you with folks who have recently done deals like the ones you want to do. 6) Consider analyzing a deal or two in your local market, just for practice, with a free use of our Rental Property Calculator (or other calculators).

My worst appreciating property has appreciated ~$2700/month over its hold.  

However, it's important to remember this trend started in the not too distant past, and for a very long time before that the norm was separate rooms, so it's not surprising that there are actually considerable disadvantages of open floorplans and advantages of more traditional ones.Opening the kitchen to the rest of the house has to be one of the worst aspects of this trend.