Credit scores are a reflection of someone's ability to learning and understanding the rules of the game and haveing the discipline to play by them.If you already have good credit, already pay everything on time (autopay), then increaseing your limits will probably help you the most, because it gets your utilization down, ideally under 10%.Higher hanging fruits are average credit and account age (just have to wait for that I guess) and inquiries, which are sometimes unavoidable as real estate investors.  

Mark my words though the 2020-decade will be as transformational, transitional, and pivotal as the 1940s.Bottom line--appreciation is where the money is made, consider cash flow a defensive play and way end of the chain of the reasons to invest in physical RE.

BRRR'ing is a great strategy to build equity but it's a riskier play and time intensive if you're trying to do it out of state.

Is this the best play here?

This gives you the benefits of ownership without the hassles of “landlording” or playing general contractor—in my opinion, it’s a more feasible arrangement if you’re looking to live in one state and own in another.The initial outlay can be pretty reasonable as well.

And that was my understanding (the basics, at least :-)...Given that, the scenario that Bob presented in Deal 3 above seems unlikely to play out legally...

@Nina Ning I do not play detective or require past rental payments to qualify for my units.

Playing it safe might mean walking away if the numbers can’t improve.

Keep in mind that you'll need to qualify full doc (DTI, employment history and income will all come into play) and the property typically needs to be titled to yur personal name, not an entity. 

Sometimes having someone play devil's advocate is also useful.