The only issue is that they're usually clumped together, meaning a lot of small time landlords dictate how the neighborhood develops, and naturally most renters are not going to do extra maintenance for someone else's property.

Technically, you do need some money, otherwise you have to figure out how to grind it out without much capital, which is what Ray did, listen to his story, it may help. 

One of my issues is I am not sure what the neighborhoods are like at the properties I find on-line.  

My dad is retired and doesn't technically have income, and we couldn't combine my income with his credit score to purchase the property.

The issue is housing, housing is 1/3 of CPI and inflation is floating at or above 3.

So, if your bathroom was un-permitted you may be required to remedy that issue with this renovation.

Since I am doing the work, I have no quality issues and believe in doing the job right.

I used to use Cozy.co as a payment and issue reporting portal for my tenants, but I didn’t like what apartments.com did with it when they bought them out.Before I had my real estate license, I’d only post my rentals to Zillow.  

Does that really help with my 2 main issues?

You'll have the same issue with 99.9% of agents.