I have found that creating a social media presence and then following & interacting with investors, flippers, lenders, attorneys, agents, etc. in your market has an infinite ROI especially for beginners.

Still think that more people should, at least, put in some effort before going to a place of worship (not that it makes any difference…).You also don’t dress up because you are in a different league – experience, volume/size of transactions and presence in the market place.

I personally have not been involved in a deal yet where it needed heavy security presence or gated entry access.

Most states will not allow a landlord or PM to enter a property without the tenants presence or knowledge  to check to see if the heat is on or the water is on or off.

For that matter, join fundamentally any REIA in the area, but I know Bernadette's local to you but with a regional presence.   

A strong presence pays off. 

Won, Washington Landlord Association doesn't have much of an on-line presence, but once you pay your dues they have great access to all the forms and they have in-house tenant screening if you don't want the applicant to do it on-line.  

If the house is worth $200,000 and the loan is $100,000 and you simply paid off the existing loan, with out follow the formulas established in the Statute, you will receive fan mail from the Attorney General asking for your presence at a party being held in your honor, and oh, we want your attorney to come along with you.There are a lot of hungry attorneys out there taking cases of "distressed" homeowners pro bono, since you will end up paying their fees.

You can learn from @Scott Meyers, @Michael Wagner (also has online presence as thestoragerebellion), Mark Helm (youtube search)! 

.- Your investment is concentrated in a property, while you can buy futures over an index and the risk is distributed among the stocks that compose the index.- Usually there is leverage associated to real estate purchases and leverage increases risk.- People tend to feel overconfident about real estate even if they dont know what they are doing.