With a PM in place, this situation should have been managed more effectively.

Philadelphia has implemented various forms legislation over the years between abatements, land banks and density bonuses geared towards promoting development in areas that suffered from disinvestment and housing affordability challenges with some legislation having been more effective than others. 

LOC's can have negative effects on your future purchasing power if not set up correctly and keeping in mind you can "never" use an LOC as a reserve or asset.It will always be a debt burden and can over inflate your back end debt ratios depending on the W2 income and your liabilities.

They will confirm to you that the number has been steadily increasing year after year (Covid or recession effects aside).

They are effectively the same.  

Regarding property management, utilizing local property managers can save you time, and using PropStream effectively for filtering properties by distress level and location will certainly help with finding stronger deals.

My investment partners and I have made considerable investments in Mount Airy over  the past few years, worked with a number of brokers on acquisitions and can honestly say not a single one has been able to effectively articulate our neighborhood investment thesis which tells you how challenging the neighborhood is. 

These are people whose full time job is to effectively manage the assets on behalf of the investors. 

Luxury vinyl plank (LVP) is a cost-effective choice for flooring, offering durability and a high-end look.

And asking an agent to run comps on 50 properties a day isn't effective.