It is hard to fight against income creep unless you have specific benchmarks that keep your spending habits subject to those benchmarks.

Outside of that, there are generally "benchmarks" where common wisdom says you should "probably" increase your coverage.

That is a minimum bench mark.

The current benchmarks my partner and I have established for the 2015 year include:Fix and Flip 2-to-3 single-family residences Establish business entity A snapshot of my current financial situation looks something like this:Income: $38,000 (PM at Architectural Consulting Firm)Assets: $13,000 (8k of which are devoted to investments)Debts: $17,500 (School Loan)With that being said, I am also debating purchasing my first primary residence and am trying to figure that into the plans.

What are you going to benchmark your statistics against to evaluate your PM's performance? 

I am finding it tough to benchmark current conventional rates for investment property - lenders seem all over the board on this, form 3.875-5%.  

Good schools are another benchmark - areas with good schools are always in demand, which is important for your resale value and stable rents. 

Obviously, I am not aiming for this type of return, but at least this gives me a benchmark on what I need to surpass a respectable return on investment.

The interest rate with this option resets at Year 6 to a new rate of Cost of Funds+3.00% (this bank uses the 5 Year Treasury Constant Maturities Index as their benchmark).

Talk to the company that quoted the repairs, they can tell you if the repairs would be a permanent fix or a temporary solution.On another note, an appraisal from 2005 should in no way, shape, or form be the benchmark you are using for value.