I saw a large building with my biz partner and we saw so many violations it was mind numbing.  

I would check them out if you're going to be pulling a large number of these types of leads consistently.

Find the ones in the drive-able distance that generate a large audience and go to them.

You can scale $0 to over a million dollars in real estate in just three years.

You wont be able to scale to 10-15 properties by using all you cash flow to pay each one off....and you wont be able to live off of one paid off property.You are going to have to leverage and then once you scale to your desired level, then start paying them off

there is just a ton of debt you have to take on and as we age we get debt adverse.. now in new construction we take on debt of course but we retire it.and yes its a job.. but when its in the right market cycles boy is it a good one  Can make more on one new build in 9 months than a rental house in 20 years.. so its just scale. and what you want to do .. 

Assuming the .5% isn't a large sum of money I'd take offer 2.

Some think it's less risky to have moor doors because you aren't hit as hard by vacancy, can take advantage of economies of scale, etc.

Questions:-should I stay away from investing in a town home due the common risks (smaller buyer pool, potential HOA issues, large competition etc)?

Before I was planning on buying a house back home earlier in the year and renting it out but instead of dropping a large down payment I could put that money in a few notes for a much better return.