Remember you have TN Sales Tax, local sales tax, and lodging tax that are passed to your renters.

I had more than on contractor borrower of mine that finally figured that out got enough equity from relatives and now they are doing quite well and no way we can compete with them.but you start moving up north of 750k to purchase and unless your in the Bay area or prime LA  that does knock out a lot of competitionand you also have to remember this poster is paying CASH  HUGE difference as she has no cost of capital most of us need to borrow and if your borrowing HM which 95% have to as banks really don't service this niche ... her carrying cost ona say 700k project would eat up 20 to 30k EASY.. 

Ideally, we’ll jump into the multi family game in Wilmington, but for now we need to find a place for our family.

@Nicholas_Weckstein thank you for the small MFR breakdown.Is the 25% down necessary or simply ideal?

You should talk about to your tax man and come up with a % that your going to consider personal vs rental property as I’m sure you know this is very important come tax time.Be sure and remember your security deposits as well, you don’t want to mix that money up either.

Obviously banks require you to have some skin in the game but ideally maximum returns will be achieved with as close to 100% financing as possible.A income property that can not produce positive cash flow with 100% financing will always require that the investor buy their cash flow with their own money.

The typical method of going through a real estate agent and using MLS doesn't seem like the ideal path (if only the easiest and most typical).  

Remember, it gets easier as you go! 

For example we have seen many properties that are ideal flip candidates but they just won't cashflow after refinancing and since we are looking to buy and hold we have had to pass.

The thing is, they wouldn't charge a closing cost and take care of all appraisal/title fees etc..Ideally, my goal is to cash flow as much as I can monthly so Traditional Cash Out Refi seems like the better way to do that.