I agree with all of this HOWEVER I will say, if you have a unique product to offer to the market, you can attract even the highest quality tenants in the rougher areas, especially if they are secure properties that are close to downtown.

Leveraging his local market expertise, we swiftly negotiated the purchase at $190,000, securing the property under favorable terms that allowed us to capitalize on the quick resale potential.

I am not suggesting you can't be successful building a SFH portfolio and to an extent cash flow is necessary to operate the portfolio, secure financing etc., but SFH's are one of the more inefficient asset classes to own.

Additionally, it can help you avoid the risk of having an offer accepted but not being able to secure financing in time.

You should never ever ever provide a loan on real estate without it being secured.

Owning the property in an LLC does help with your debt-to-income (DTI) ratio, but it can make securing a loan more challenging.

Did you refund the whole security deposit or were there repairs?

I do not recommend pulling a home equity loan as a first time investor if you are buying a fixer-upper, the current rate environment is not favorable for rehab projects that run way past their scheduled timeline and you don't want to run into a situation where your family can't meet loan payments while your house is securing the loan. 

Gradually building your real estate portfolio without compromising your retirement security.4.

Ultimately if you have proper insurance, 99.9% of plaintiff's attorneys are going to be most focused on securing the insurance carrier's cooperation because the plaintiff's attorney is most likely representing their client on a contingent basis and the insurance proceeds are how they are compensated.