Am I correct that a condo, depending on area and neighborhood, could be a lower risk/maintenance investment for an absentee landlord as opposed to other properties?

You’ll need to treat it like a business—handling tenant management, accounting, legal compliance, property maintenance, and more.That said, when done correctly, it’s a powerful tool for building wealth!

That would be a helpful addition to your plan as you would further reduce your cost of living.Also don’t forget from that $600 you are planning on getting in cash flow you have taxes, insurance, maintenance, capex, and vacancy to consider.With two homes, you may want to keep that extra $20k as an emergency fund rather than spending it on a third property and then be left with no emergency funds.

Maintenance, We had a pool so I know first hand, you really need daily work on a pool. 

Multi-family properties many times provide a better return per square foot than single family, which would be to your advantage as well.As long as you're mindful of the reinvestment requirements and purchase at least as much as you sold and use all of the proceeds, you shouldn't have any issues with this strategy.

That means weekly on going preventative maintenance fixing small problems before they become big problems. 

Same carpet in b+ area will get 10 years plus.i stand by my sustaining maintenance/cap ex estimate and hope my response indicates why.  

If your estimated rent from a property pays off the Mortgage + Maintenance + Property Tax + Insurance.

The structure is mainly appreciation-based, which minimizes tenant and maintenance risk. 

The real estate investing industry uses "Classes" to rank property performance risk, but there's NO agreed upon industry model:(Here's what we use for our Metro Detroit market:Recommend you first figure out the property Class you want to invest in, THEN figure out the corresponding location to invest in.Property Class will typically dictate the Class of tenant you get, which greatly IMPACTS rental income stability and property maintenance/damage by tenants.If you apply Class A assumptions to a Class B or C purchase, your expectations won’t be met and it may be a financial disaster.If you buy/renovate a property in Class D area to Class A standards, what quality of tenant will you get?