Or the affiliates/marketers of the guru education programs pretending to know what they are talking about and skirting the soliciting rules in the forums!

Let's pretend it's a generous 1 yr CD with no early withdrawal penalty.7 year CD: 2% and penalized six months of interest if you pull funds out early.If you pull funds out after exactly 12 months, it's a wash:1 yr CD @ 1 yr: $10k * 1% = $100.7 yr CD @ 1 yr with penalty: $10k * 2% - [$10k * 2% / 2] = $100.After 18 months...1 yr CD @ 1.5 years: $10k * 1% * 1.5 years = $150.7 yr CD @ 1.5 years and penalized six months of interest: $10k * 2% * 1.5 years - [$10k * 2% * 0.5 years] = $200.So there's your low risk / low reward "CD hacking" tip of the day to get rich by earning an extra $50 on $10k after a year and a half.

-This place is so bad, I think the bank is probably doing the "maybe if we pretend it's not there, it won't be," kind of thing, as this is not a place any bank wants to deal with.

I also love YNAB for personal budgeting and use it religiously (knowing your income/expenses to the penny is key to profitable money management), so for the past few months I've increased my savings by pretending I'm carrying a note on a BRRRR and paying money into an account as if I'm in the middle of a 6 month rehab phase.I recommend that if you haven't laid out a business plan yet, grab a pen and paper and start mapping out your goals and how you'll get there. 

Pretend that Fred and Jill live next to one another in Denver.

It's not exactly a "fair" assumption but you have to put yourself in the shoes of an owner who's being solicited on a platform where it takes about 3 minutes to create a fake profile and/or pretend to be someone else.  

(ah, so paid answering service given the script "this is zillow" I use one as well for my business accept that the service pretends they are in my office referring the call to me instead of pretending to work for a totally different company in a bid to trick the caller). 

Pretend you have girl scout cookies to sell.

You can use tax records to look up the owner of a property and confirm that the person on the phone owns it (however they can lie about their name.)Its not to late to have a friend call and pretend to be a different landlord and ask these questions as well.

@Philip Amundson Admittedly I would say most properties do need some small repairs and/or updating to maximize rent so I'm not going to pretend you will be able to find a 100% turn key property, however if you can find one, then it will preserve your cash and set you up better for #2.