We get a pretty fat book with all of the research and projected financials for the first 5 years. 

I have learned that it is easier/bettrr to allow animals and get a fat refundable deposit.

LOL.. non appreciating rentals need to be held forever or your going to be stroking a check to sell them.. unless your 1031 and for ever going to landlord.. that's a given.. you need appreciation to pay the recapture and gain from basis andif they are SFR's and you are going to retail them you need 5 to 20k to take your beat up rental and make it nice enough that a family will buy it to live in.I went through this with new construction I bought in 05 ish.. what was in style then was not when I went to sell in the last few years. as I exit my rentals  tile counters NO good  need slab granite.. builder grade appliances Nope need new stainless.. etc etc I would say I put 10k on average into each home to sell them.. then it took 90 180 days of them sitting there vacant then I had recapture.. so to me the juice of these is simply not worth the squeeze I would rather sell real estate have no debt and make nice fat 10 to 20k checks..

You’re not even making $100 a door I can in move them to $700/month per room after their lease is up (average 3%) and then the cash flow would be $519/month

Know that they will use every angle they can in order to squeeze out what they can.

wow, everyone has lots of great advice,and I see people saying save money, and when I was younger I thought that was the way to start too,but if you get a job and save as much money as you can in the next year to two what is the most you could possible come up with?

Looking forward to reading as much as I can in the forums and learning from everyone's success and failures.Also looking forward to networking and working with people inside and outside the area too.Pleasure to make your acquaintance!

@Coleman Nelson Yes you can in QuickBooks - but before I say 100% can you send me your sample report, what you are looking for?

If you were his employer and just hired him, and he comes in late every day of his first week... warning lights would go off and you would be letting them go..I wish you only the best, and as @David Avetisyan mentioned - this is an expensive lesson learned but one you can in turn share with others! 

Go to every RE meetup you can in your area.