Would love to connect and pick your brains on the process!

Take them to coffee and pick their brain. 

My first question is do I pick a good, better, best system that costs from less to more $$ and do I justify the more expensive energy efficient system to grab a little higher rents since tenants will save money.

From mold to people picking at it, caulk will need touched up at least once per year.

Another tactic you could try is Google searching "Keller Williams Brokerage Near Me" just pick up the phone and call the front desk.

If you want an actionable plan one thing you could do is pick the town/city you are thinking of investing in and start doing market research on it.

They usually cherry-pick fire and safety related items from new editions of the building code that just can't wait, in their opinion.

So how many did you pick up since the post ? 

For Livermore, the activity is slower compared to the general Bay Area so you would need to be more cautious on picking the right property to flip, and the margin has to be large enough for it to make sense.

I am reviewing the spreadsheet on bigger pockets on how to pick a market to start investing.