I would say you need to play to your strengths, whatever those might be.

A little over 15 years ago, in the late spring of 2009, I was a brand spanking new real estate agent coming off of a miserably failed real estate investment venture.

His advice would mirror mine - to start your company, build your brand, add value to the forums here on BP if you're going to post, create the marketing for your idea, and then work your backside off to make it work. 

He had other projects that he committed to.Want to play a challenging game?

I don't play around with other people's money.As for sticking to Gilbert or checking out other cities around Phoenix, I'm doing my best to look at every city. 

Japanese people culturally like brand new and shiny products and you will have a small market of investors who won't touch unless you offer attractive yields.

This clearly has nothing to do with laws, regulations or operating numbers but I do think it plays a large role in the decline of the market.

There are many good locations - I'd suggest that you play around with the "Market Finder" tool at the top of the screen here, included with your pro membership. 

It’s easy to say “just screen better,” but I imagine truly tightening up criteria without killing occupancy can be an art.Since you’ve seen this play out firsthand, I’d love to hear more—what specific strategies have you used to filter out the bad tenants from the good ones?

Plus I recently got a brand new calculator, wanted to see what out of state investors though the most important aspects of deciding between to similar rates cap rates in 2 varied size apartment.