I've exhausted my conforming Fannie/Freddie backed loans (10) so the deal numbers must be better than every deal I've done to date to work at commercial/portfolio loan interest rates and shorter amortization periods. 

Shawn,I do not agree with your assessment on the commercial side.If you are talking about paying ALL CASH for a property then at 1.2 million and below you will have more limited inventory.What I don't understand is why you are not trying to leverage with financing versus exhausting all your cash??

Do most investor buying out of state, investing for the first time or are they experienced already exhausted their local market?

As a lender, I have thoroughly exhausted attempting to use this for a couple clients in this situation. 

(i.e. when will you sell, what is the NOI, and what is your cap rate assumption - I recommend assuming a cap rate that is 20 to 50 bps, which is 0.2% to 0.5%, higher than the in-place cap rate).This is by no means exhaustive but should give you a good place to start.

While some increased equity may occur the upcomming interest rates increases will wipe most of that out and they will be in need of selling that which they purchased and the discounts of today will be available once again to the astute investor watching for this to begin happening.While some of it will occur sooner than the time period listed there will be those who will not give up on their dream until their "nest egg" is exhausted.

No clearances, there is nothing wrong with this installation. the 3' you may be referring to is for Exhaust pipes of gas fire appliances, not the gas meter ( which the meter and piping are all sealed). there is an electrical code of 30" work space clearance in front of an electrical panel, but the meter does not interfere with that. just make sure the panel box is a sealed box and rated for outdoors.

Trying to exhaust all angles on these 2... :)

Exhausting.

My thought on a situation like that is checking the fresh-air intake, and the exhaust, to see if your getting a cross breeze too strong that's blowing out pilot.