The MSA city data that you providing is looking from a macro level just like looking at the PE ratio of a Blue Chip Fortune 500 Company Stock.

He is a 45 year old man who has worked at a fortune 500 company for 20 years and has plenty of income, but has bad credit now due to the divorce.

The comps didn't include that house, or the larger one (1800 sq ft) down the street listed for 200... but whatever.. one set of comps said 171, the other said 160, 165-170 seems right to me.That said, it would rent for about 1150/mo, and I was fortunate enough to be in a position to pay cash, so with low property taxes (1800/yr), I have a lot of options on how to profit from it.Obviously the first things to deal with are the fixes, the major stuff is all good, it's just cosmetic stuff for the most part.  

After reading Rich Dad Poor Dad ~ 2-3 years back, I knew I didn’t want anything to fancy (fixed up) or to close to market value, so my first target for buying my first home was going to be foreclosures (ideally that did not require too much work).My plan was to gain a bit of equity by fixing up a foreclosure and eventually either selling it or using the equity in the house (3-5 years down the road) to buy my first rental property.As luck would have it, I was fortunate enough to find a house that matched my criteria and was also fortunate enough to win my bid on a nice house (foreclosed).The icing on the cake for this deal was that my initial purchase price was $50,000 less than the appraised value.As a result, I now have a potential $60,000 in equity in the house.

Paint Int/extMajor demo/trashUpdate both baths, including cutting into slab in basement in order to set the tub to floor levelCut in a sliding door in basement great roomNew kitchen, knock down wall to open upLightingnew Flooring: laminate planks, vinyl, tile baths, carpet, etcMajor landscaping in the back yard: we had no idea there was a 30x20 foot cement patio back there, I didn't include the pics, but it was so over grown with stuff, we never saw it when we bought it.All other basic cosmetic stuff that you do to make a new house: door, trim, etc.TOTAL REHAB Costs: Roughly $46,000The unfortunate and fortunate part of this project was that I didn't have any freed up contractors to work on the project when I purchased it. 

Fortunately, our rent covered ALL of the assessment but we made $0.00 in cash flow.

There is going to be another Fortune 100 company moving in.  

So I decided to focus on the screening process and, knock on wood, I have been fortunate so far.

I am fortunate to say that I am going to be inheriting a real estate business when I turn 24.

I estimated about 45K in repairs, the first estimate came in at 85K ... fortunately I had two other bids and the one I liked best was 49K... so I wasn't far off, I just need to stick to someone who doesn't use a ton of subs.4.