Now I am taking a leap of faith ( go bold or go home).

There is story after story here and many other places to support that statistic. 4th - loan sources for 5 plus investment properties.

Are you kidding me to think thats statistically significant???

@Peter Pearson I'd love to share my notes on how to statistically evaluate an area for investment using Temecula, San Marcos and Fallbrook as examples.

I've seen various statistics, inventorys, economics, and directions.  

It is not discriminatory to disclose that an area is high crime or has low rated schools regardless of the racial make up of the community, that is just measurable fact about the area.And sorry, knowing whether an area is depressed or not is not a judgement call it should be  and is easily identifiable by area statistics.  

A great resource for LA outsiders to find relevant information about the little neighborhoods inside Los Angeles is: http://maps.latimes.com/neighborhoods/ ...it shows how wildly Income, employment rates, rent-to-own ratios, and crime statistics differ wildly between the little neighborhoods of L.A. 

Statistics say that 80% of response is on the 6th to 12th contact.

While the anecdotal evidence provided here by most posters is born out in fact we can actual look at basic RE market statistics and economics to see why Theo is correct and his friend is not.RE rents are "sticky" compared to home prices, at least in the short and medium term.  

Thanks,Tim I haven't looked at the latest statistics in Illinois but closing a short sale after an accepted offer can take from 3 to 4 months.