I hope someday I'm in a position to give meaningful input (I'm in expert at SAAS sales if anyone wants help in that arena!!) 

Some, who run mortgage pools, might ask for these to show their investors they are performing proper due diligence, whether truly meaningful or not.

People who get suckered into these deals may be able to extract cash flow in good cases, but that doesn't mean it's the best possible first move you could make into the multifamily RE investing world.What I would do is basically tell myself that this place is worth about $10,000 per door, and that's it.

I love to give useful and meaningful answers on Quora for other people's queries but I think BiggerPockets is the better reliable source.

Hopefully it's a quick an easy extraction (let me know if you are interested in a couple of tank pullers I can refer you to).  

Favorable business conditions and a reasonable cost of living are largely driving growth.It's the tertiary markets: midland/Odessa, eagle ford, etc that will be impacted in a meaningful way by oil prices.

If you borrow in an LLC/Corp the DTI residential lenders care about becomes far less meaningful.    

If it's a short sale or foreclosure , you as the second or perhaps the third offer, have much better leverage to extract a better sale price.

Everyone says wholesaling is an inexpensive way to break into REI and it can be but to get any type of meaningful real flow you are going to need to spend $$$. 

As a lender, I know I have a lot of vehicles available to investors that are helpful in getting parents to assist their kids in this, and I look forward to sharing my expertise with anyone, but I really want to know what you're finding or have found to be a successful and meaningful learning experience for your kids in this arena.