Understand the fees involved and calculate the total cost for an entire year of management so you can compare the different managers.

I think if you are going to keep all three parties involved as owners of the deal long term then you need to separate yourself as a renter and a contractor.

Anything beyond that makes me wonder if he might stay too involved.

My wife also made it clear that if we were going to expand beyond what we already own, she didn’t want to be involved in managing them.

I want to preface this by saying I'm an absolute newbie when it comes to real estate investing, but the more books and resources I consume, the more I find myself gravitating towards commercial real estate, specifically hotels!

I do not believe I am RentRedi's target consumer as I have more needs than others and that has been true for other business relationships I tried to build in my time, but I hate when things have to end on sour notes and the fact that it took publicly criticizing the service to get attention is more than disappointing on RentRedi's part as a service business.

In the Bigger Pockets free book, "Real Estate Rewind", as one of the 11 co-authors I wrote about one such Tax Sale purchase and made money but not enough money to warrant the risk involved.

My humble advice to anyone attempting to do creative finance is:Creative finance is for experienced investors who have access to capital if anything goes wrong.Learn the lawsDon't use a contract "off the internet", laws vary by state and are also regulated on a federal levelLearn the financing techniques correctlyDon’t skip parts of the processDon’t ever do a “kitchen table” closingUse the proper deedAn attorney can help you with the legal work, but the rest you are on your ownYour guru will not bail you out“Investing” in someone else’s deal by providing a small 2nd loan so the “investor” can pay for “cash to the seller” and for “closing costs” so he can do the deal is a very bad planKnow what problems can ariseLearn the responses and solutions to problems before they are neededKnow everything there is to know about Title and what that meansKnow who a "protected class" individual isLearn the "back doors"Learn human natureUnderstand timelinesUnderstand regulation enforcement (some of these "mistakes" have a 10 year statue of limitations ( they can charge you 10 years AFTER you do the transaction) and carry hefty fines and possible imprisonmentThe court doesn't accept "I didn't know" for an answer"Know that the source of the lead plays a serious role in some states and federallyKnow how much of a "profit" pushes the boundaries to invite an investigationYou can be sued by the seller if you don’t do things correctlyYou are automatically at fault if an investigator or attorney or regulator gets involved.

I was involved in two small infill developments in Michigan (about 15 houses in total) so two very small parcels. 

Decide how involved in real estate you want to be.