Now your a 62 yr young couple from Athens TX who recently retired and always dreamed of seeing London, Big Ben, having fish & chips, riding the "tube"..... 

Long term buy and hold RE in good locations is probably one of the lowest risk investment vehicles IMO, similar to blue chip aristocrat stocks except even less risky because even long-established companies can go out of business but real estate very, very rarely ever goes to zero. 

I have another one were I optioned 120 acres that just got brought into long term planning for chips act. paid 5 million for it and spend 10k a month negative..

This can then be used as a negotiation chip in order to lower the price of the property.

.-- The carpet was nasty and walls unpainted and chipping.- The bathroom flooring was covered in mold and needed to be replaced.- The kitchen sink was unsecured and fell into the kitchen cabinet.- My insurance was cancelled until I fixed roof issues.- Debris littered the recently occupied unit, the basement, and all over the back yard.As mentioned, we had an initial video walk through before the contract to purchase.

And this one cracked me up: "We were sipping lukewarm coffee from chipped mugs, half convinced we’d made a mistake."

Send them a pizza, crackers, and chips & salsa. 

I'd suggest Ibonds, treasuries, and blue chip stocks with a good dividend.

The biggest thing I have encountered in numerous inspections is chipped or flaking paint in pre-1978 homes that have children living in them.

When my places with section 8 tenants are inspected yearly the inspectors just want to be sure that the paint isn’t flaking and thereby causing a situation that a small child may ingest the paint chips.