It worked out to be one of our best from an ROI perspective, but we did a property in a more budget conscious neighborhood, about 2 miles from ours, and missed the mark. 

Love the idea of the conscious spending plan and point 6, believing that wanting to get rich is bad.

In regards to reserve funds, just a reminder to be conscious of / have a plan for the unexpected expensesIf you just have the 3.5% downpayment, but not an extra $7k to pay your own closing costs (and make the deal 100% "your own"), what happens when there any any repairs needed?

I'm upfront with lenders that I'm conscious of my credit and want them to run the numbers with an estimated credit score I provide them.

I have had my account for a while but I am wanting to make a conscious effort to be more engaged.

This isn't overly complicated, but it does take conscious effort to make sure everything is handled correctly, every time.  

I'm not understanding why the electricity is an issue, given one of the major advantages of single family is that you can offload all of the utilities onto the tenant.. of course I'd look into this for ecologic reasons.

Sometimes no.Case in point #1:  a married couple with 4 kids would probably like more space, so the bigger unit should rent for more if you are consciously target marketing for large families. 

Ultimately my goal is to use as much reclaimed and environmentally conscious materials as possible and make older homes more carbon neutral. less carbon is used to update homes than it takes to build new, so if I can convert and make them more efficient then I can do good for the environment and the community, at least that's my idea.

Yes, I've read a lot about how people end up getting cold feet and continue to just only read and never really make anything happen so I'm consciously trying to avoid that (hence why I posted in the first place because I was already hesitating to do just that.)Appreciate the response!