However, many of the buy and hold deals I'm seeing investors do this year look like pure speculation to me, where there the deal is nothing more than a bet on the continued upward trajectory of the Austin market.

Today I was able to close on my first SFH purchased purely as investment.

Pure and simple.  

I will admit it – I was hungry- I wanted more but I didn’t have the skills or experience to do it on my own, I didn’t want another job - I was sacred –  I was sold on all the propaganda about real estate riches and continued to search for that magic formula.That was over 40 years ago - as I think back about all those programs - I realized that my intuition, creativity, imagination or the pure synergism of all that information enable me to create hybrid formulas of my own – formulas that helped me avoid conventional financing, credit approvals, cash down payments, real estate agents, gate keeps and those others who wanted to delay my progress of making money in real estate.

I reckon they came up with $240k purely because they believe the market can justify limiting your return to just 10%.

Basically the only thing we didn't charge tenant for was painting, and we did charge paint fee if there was nicotine stained walls.

Will you be living in the multi or will it be pure investment?

If looking purely for investment purposes townhomes and single family homes zoned for short term rental are an option and may provide a more predictable occupancy profile provided it is properly managed. 

Proforma numbers are generally pure pipe dream, so figure out the real numbers based on what they give you.

If it were a pure investment property, HOA would be a deal breaker.