We use the capital for down payments and finance the rest of the purchases through traditional financing.

As practice, I'd love to crunch the numbers and come up with a price I think is fair, then compare that to the winning bid at the end.

It may be you get a construction loan and then when done you refinance with a more traditional loan.

People in Friendswood commute longer to work compared to their Pearland counter parts.4.

So it's a question of should I use my funds as 20% down on an SFR and rent it out as a traditional investment or should I use those same funds as 5% down (or lower) on a fourplex as a primary residence where I take advantage of the financing programs, live in one unit, and rent the others. 

My understanding is my max cashout refinance is 75% from a traditional bank. 

Insurance is one of those things where you really have to understand it to compare apples to apples (i.e. same coverage/service to same coverage/service). 

If so, what is the address of the property so that I could do a quick Comparable Market Analysis  on the home? 

While I own a number of "traditional" rentals in other parts of the state, this will be my first experience in the college rentals as well as vacation rentals.  

The secondary market, non-traditional lenders, is huge if you know where the money is.