You will find yourself working for just the cash flow with little upside.It's really all about your local market and the tenant base at the property that will dictate cap rates.

My lease dictates how payments are applied.  

If it's strictly a rental property, the value will be dictated by the income.

you can get a rehab loan from a smaller bank usually..hardmoney is very expensive, and you still have to worry about refinancing into a long term loan....as far as numbers...the amount you pay, or the amount of yoru mortgage doesn't dictate your rents....you figure out your rents by driving rental comps and calling for rent signs in the area...that's how you know how muchrent to charge...from there, you know how much youcan afford to pay for the property--not the other way around....side note: weren't you the one that was buying a few apartment buildings?

Your building/road layout might dictate you build 240 or 204, thenthat is what you build.

So your budget and what you can afford is what will dictate where you should be buying in the market.

Is this a personal decision or is it dictated by the market I am working in?

Every buyer wants a deal but the market demand dictates what properties trade for.With CAM on the leases look for controllable versus non-controllable cap amounts and if they are cumulative or non-cumulative.

I currently own a vacation rental property and we were able to dictate our terms during the purchase.

I like that the value is derived from the NOI and cap rates in the area - that gives the owner a lot of ability to dictate the price by lowering expenses and maximizing revenue.