It's kind of like dating a girl who just got out of an abusive relationship, which makes you look like an angel by comparison. 

I suspect your Tenants are abusing the cooling system and not ventilating the home properly.you could potentially fix this with a dehumidifier to suck the moisture out of the air.My response would be exactly what Greg wrote.

@Ryan Jackson, if a military member gets deployed and clauses out they certainly are not abusing the system at all. 

I appreciate the experiences you guys have shared.To sum it up, it seems the major concerns include making sure the work gets done before actually paying the person or deducting it from the rent (also something that would need to be done with a regular contractor) and proper relationship maintenance, ie keeping the tenant relationship separate from the contractor relationship so it isn't abused. 

I love my job and at the same time, it's pure abuse to my body.

This is due to the outrageous abuses sellers used to swindle buyers out of properties they made payments on for 10,20 even 30 years.  

. :)talk about starting at the bottom.. this is one thing I see on BP where people that are new think they are being mentored when they are being used and abused and really not learning diddly about a real estate career... bandit signs not withstanding..

My family and I are actually in the process right now of selling our house in Tennessee and moving west to go convert a bus into a rolling tiny home to which we can live wherever we can find a place to park well aggressively pursuing real estate investing.

The only one that was any good was a mom-and-pop where they were managing their own units alongside mine and treating them with the same level of care, unfortunately when they scaled their PM business they sold it to a large "professional" PM (good for them, bad for me) who then proceeded to financially abuse their newly acquired clients and run the business into the ground.So, chances are they both suck, but you have slightly better odds with mom-and-pop if it meets my description above.

. - Love the "previously used" reference - for those of us who have been in the construction industry for a long time, you can bet we've been used and abused!