If you are clearing $100/door with mortgages, each month, and your rent is $1200, one month of vacancy killed your entire cash flow for the year - two months means you better have a job or some extra money sitting around to pay that mortgage. 

First of all, great job.

It seems that to be on Section 8 you need to look for a job on a regular basis.

Vitaliy, gave you solid advice and did a good job of explaining some of the key issues.

It would be best to befriend a local contractor or even help one out on a job to see any differences from your past eight years doing it in another country.

Your job, your savings, sounds like you have a supportive dad, you live in a place you evidently love, you’ve had exposure to the business.

Also, focus on 2 years of job/income stability.Class D Properties:Cashflow vs Appreciation: Typically, all cashflow with little, maybe even negative, relative rent & value appreciationVacancy Est: 20%+ should be used to cover nonpayment, evictions & damages.Tenant Pool: majority will have FICO scores under 560 (almost 30% probability of default), little to no good tradelines, lots of collections & chargeoffs, recent evictions.

This job took us about 9-10 months if I remember correctly.

I suspect if someone contests could be longer.I also think once you go to mediation this will get worked out pretty quick mediators if you get a good one do a nice job putting these deals together..

Other than that, the city is largely residential with many jobs focused around providing for those residential needs such as the service industry sector, home repair, construction, etc.