Therefore, rather than going through a lengthy and expensive foreclosure on the property, the bad tenant buyer is now only a tenant and can be evicted.

Around here, the eviction process is lengthy (60 days minimum) and costly ($1000 easily) so IF someone has a good history, and has given us proper notice, perhaps even already scheduled their move-out inspection, I don't lose any sleep.

Tax Liens destroy the returns you can get from a CD with the bonus of maybe foreclosing on a property or two after a lengthy legal process in our land courts. 

I have a lengthy Legal Opinion, from my seasoned Legal Team regarding this matter.

LIke a mini hedge fund. but a little more complicated than that.. and too complicated to describe on this site.. it would lead to a lengthy debate  LOL... suffice it to say when I sold last year I was a very happy camper had a nice liquidity event. 

In excel calculating yield can be very lengthy formulas if you do it properly - there are shortcuts that get you close but to calculate true yield you need to input revenue and expenses by month

I'm not sure how lengthy and expensive the eviction process is in your state but in Alabama it can be quite painful.

Account ClosedNo similar reports that I'm aware of, however I could post some links that provide a big picture view that are typically put out once a year by a couple RE firms and Wichita State U.JP Weigands (probably the largest firm in town) 2015 outlook http://www.weigandforecast.com/video of the presentation -- http://www.weigandcommercial.com/marketsummary.htm...Commercial firm NAI Martens Forecasthttp://www.naimartens.com/Portals/227/Forecast%20l...WSU Center for RE main page - lots of info there -- http://realestate.wichita.edu/Hope that helps, have quite a few of my observations as well, however might get a bit lengthy for an online discussion and better suited offline.I'm attempting the snowball method myself - I'm in the stage of making the initial small snowball larger - seems to take forever, though I'm at a point where I see an end in sight.  

Checkbook control usually is a tad more expensive to set up than an IRA account that requires all investments to go through the sometimes lengthy custodian approval process, but again… find out what’s best for you.Are there any restrictions on what I can invest in?

I enjoyed reading your honest and somewhat lengthy post. :) I'm also a real estate novice (without the bangin' financial background though), but I've learned quite a lot since I joined two weeks ago.