You need to surround yourself with the right people, be selective with your project choice and be conservative with capital disbursement. 

First-Time Home Buyer:Some lenders might be more conservative with first-time home buyers, asking for higher down payments or additional reserves.

Always be conservative on price..

Conservatively estimating new construction costs as $300/sq foot, the new duplexes could cost about $600,000 each to build (plus interest costs).

Was I too conservative?  

It’s also helpful to run conservative numbers and plan for vacancy or maintenance issues that might be harder to manage from afar. 

Are you a risk taker or conservative, are you organized or disorganized, are you emotionally intelligent or think more with your heart?

Much of the federal land out here in the west is used as range land for ranchers, oil and gas extraction, logging, mining, military training, recreation and conservation areas, etc. so it's not like it's not being used.

I have 25 properties in Memphis, and they cash flow $80-$100K per year, or $50K-$70K after CapEx.But that's with a conservative strategy, not the Section 8/BRRRR gurus path -- totally agree there are some scam artists out there.

To support some of the challenges some residents may have that feel they conserve while others don't, you can also take the # of occupants and the square footage and come out w/a higher ratio for larger units w/more people.