Cap rates, location, and understanding the cost per door alongside your mechanicals and capex is going to be key when buying multi-family. 

Lot's of people like to bang the gong of cash-flow, but reality is cash-flow is a mechanism of sustainability of operations, not some big profit center. yes, some like to twist it to be, via various function of neglect.

@Roger D Jones what about a mechanic's lien?  

Mechanics lien? 

I made a few sacrifices, they won't.I think people are either just lazy or scared of failure to take any action which ultimately leads them to live a non financially free life.

People you hear about just going for it either have help in the background or have a high risk tolerance for failure (unlimited capital).

that describes the medium or the mechanism of the true underlying investing action. 

Properties, for novices, which look good on paper and have good cash flow usually come with C to D+ areas, risky tenants, and a lot of cap ex that you can't see on the internet (basements, roofs, water issues, outdated mechanicals).You are turning a terrible loss into a springboard which is great, but you are trying to move too quickly it sounds like.

Even though it did not go as planned and we turned out to not be profitable, I think it's just as important to talk about our failures as much as our successes.

Unless you have a very high maintenance tenant or tons of old plumbing/mechanicals you can do really well by having an 'emergency list' of really good handymen, plumbers, hvac tech, etc.