Ive looked into signs, direct mail (with data from melissdata.com) etc.

Based on demographic and housing data, e.g. population, population growth, median age, homes owned, homes rented, job growth etc.

I'm learning more this way than having a buyers agent just spoon feed me the deals and cart me around.The only thing I want an agent for is to ensure the contract is drawn up properly and the offer letter contains all the contingencies to cover my ***.

You ensure through your techniques that the properties you purchase are well below market value.

What checks and balances do you have in place to ensure that your referral fee is secure?

This is more a rule for single family houses than apartments, but still a good rule of thumb for apartments as well.You can argue whether an experienced landlord in specific locations can ever get expenses lower than 45% on-average, but I think 99.9% of experienced landlords would never honestly believe you could get expenses anywhere near where you have them (25%).You can take Mike's advice and plan for 45-50% expenses (he has dozens of data points to support it), or you can stick with your own estimates, and consider it a learning opportunity a couple months down the road...Good luck!

How do I protect both parties to ensure that this goes accordingly?

Because short sales are currently net 80-82% of Fair Market Value to Fannie--which is more than Fannie gets from an REO sale, not to mention that by the time the property goes to foreclosure, it's worth far less in most areas of the country and has sometimes been vandalized. http://www.rebuild.org/news-article/foreclosure-and-stripping-homes/ To ensure that the former homeowner is ready to purchase again in two years, s/he should pay all their other debts on time and use no more than 50% credit capacity on credit cards.According to the Mortgage Debt Forgiveness Act of 2007, the amount of mortgage deficiency (known as "phantom income") will be forgiven if the house is owner occupied.

Using historical data, census bureau for income and NAR for housing prices, from 1968 to 1999, housing prices averaged 2.769 times yearly income.

Ensuring your house will pass a Section 8 inspection may require additional items.Even though I got a credit from the seller to fix a broken pipe, I still overpaid, given what I ended up spending.