I also think extra care needs to be applied when you are dealing with a time sensitive homeowner (pending foreclosure).

I can see the authors points that gold "hoarding" does not hurt industry, only hurts govts printing too much money, thus safeguards the savings of everyone.

@Jeffrey SealyTo @James Evertson’s great point, there is a lot of time sensitive pressure in student rentals that doesn’t exist in a lot of other niches.

I see no issue to your tenants they are not working on or replacing the siding, it's only when it's disturbed. like drilling into it or removing it that proper safe guards are done to contain and dispose of.

I am interested in a spreadsheet that can do sensitivity analysis based on changing cap rates and rents.

@Dave Foster As a former agent, I'm always sensitive to people wanting to blame the agent for any and every thing.  

As a noob, I am definitely sensitive to this.

This works OK for relatively static and simple investments like a private placement or crowdfund, but can become rather cumbersome and expensive with a more time sensitive and transaction intensive asset such as a rental property.

In my opinion, yes a realtor has more safeguards in place and usually has more protections for themselves and their business, but in a market like we have now in many places there are lots of brokers just signing agents in hopes of capturing more volume and from what I see, offering much less quality service than in a normal or slow market.I guess part of the way I view them, without a very established relationship- the wholesaler is the yard sale, craigslist listing or facebook marketplace item. 

May cost a little more but could save you time getting tenants out, it ensures they leave property in current conditions, and safe guards you from having to do evictions.