It is not very difficult or complicated to evaluate commercial real estate, there are plenty of good books available that can teach you how, textbooks, online courses, community college classes, even excellent youtube videos etc, and it is actually quite enjoyable in the process to learn.

I'm in a drive to beach market so I'm on it but I would think college towns, mountains etc. might be similar.

I live near a local college and this is in the East Bay Area, CA.

Now I previously mentioned i was willing to pay more than my competition.

It would likely be comparable to what you pay in the NE.Just google "Lexington County tax estimator" or whatever county you're interested in and you'll usually find a web tool from the County you can use to estimate the tax bill based on the previous year's assessments.There is also a law called the ATI tax exemption that can potentially lower than 6% rate by 25%.

Quote from @Christine Song: Has anyone invested in AAA Storage growth fund or PassiveStorage.com?

Did you know the seller previously or did you have to build a rapport with them in order to do this?

In previous roles, I was responsible for the asset management, capital improvement, repair, and maintenance of an ANG Fighter Base worth over $400M.

We've actually previously had two potential buyers come forth, one w/ $20k & one w/ $30k - unsolicited offers that we let get away before we even considered owner financing (or knew what it entailed).

The previous owner took exceedingly good care of the building and there was nothing that need to be done except to raise the rents.