Pick the right set of securities (like my friend who basiclaly just bought apple for the past 20 years) or the right real properties, you can make out like a bandit.Apples to apple comparisons are difficult. 

Imagine if you could buy apple stock without using your own money, but you get all the appreciation and dividends.

Also ROI should be annualized in order make apples to apples comparison of investments.

Yes, there are bad apples and those are the ones that deter everyone from being a landlord. 1.

If one wants to compare apples to apples, then be honest and compare good implementations of both models against one another.

Sales and management is apples and oranges. 

Otherwise, you make a TON of assumptions on operating expenses that are almost never apples to apples.

That helps you to get bids that are apples to apples for comparison purposes.3.

It also gives you a more comparable bid, more of apple to apple bid, not apple to orange. you know how you shop for comps before you buy the house?

Chinese cuisine is so varied, it's hard to compare apples to apples.