My legal-to-English translation of the purchase contract is "we won't guarantee anything, we don't know anything, we won't pay for anything, good luck."

Because a short term rental is technically allowed by ordinance doesn't translate into a happy life for you. 

Translation: $000000

I've had a realtor tell me they "work with investors" but I had to be exclusive with them, and I needed to fly out there, and they are not willing to find me 70% market deals--translation "I work with investors, but I don't actually work with investors and I am a liar and a nightmare to work with and I'll waste a ton of your time while forcing you to sign an exclusivity contract."

I know it can be done because I've sat on google translate to annotate German tax returns into English, along with past-dated USD currency conversions to get a loan through, but yeah this is one where you need to shop primarily the competence of the lender, and shop it hard.

You can translate that last phrase as 'you may be hard pressed to execute' in your new endeavor. 

I'm not taking my proeprty off the market for 30 or 45 days, maybe longer as it may require to be extended, to some guy who drives up in a 95 Ford who claims to be some real estate investor (translation, some jobless guy who probably has questionablle credit and no money).If the seller has tried to sell for 286 days and no hits, another 30 days probably will not be a problem, so a motivated seller might look at anything.

This translates into making offers sometimes over ask because the other buyers will eat you alive at ask, or making offers without contingencies or choosing when not to give right to cure or having the advantage of a large sum for earnest money or a blitz closing (Thanks @Jason Dominski!)

A lot of the properties we've looked at recently for rentals had a pretty big (and often unwarranted) jump in the tax appraisal value from 2014 to 2015, translating to higher property taxes.

It's the Rhode Island Landlord Tenant Handbook and it's been around for 15+ years now (last updated in 2007 I think).I'd say it's required reading, and should be read before you read other, more generic (non-RI-specific) books on the subject, just to set the context and obligations framework in your mind properly.Note that the RI LTH is more or less a layman's translation of the RI Residential Landlord and Tenant Act (i.e., RI General Laws Chapter 34-18) which is the body of RI landlord-tenant laws covering things like security deposits, evictions, required notices & timelines, default rental terms (in the absence of a lease - not recommended), etc.So if you think the RI Landlord Tenant Handbook is dry, compare it to the source material (the laws) and you'll go back and think it's just fine and dandy :)Good luck and you can post any questions you have here on BP of course!