I have family in Houston, Dallas, and the Valley, I was networking with brokers in San Antonio, but the Taxes seem to be quite high as well in that State, although much favorable laws/regs on the landlord side.

You need to have the ability to contact previous landlord to verify previous rental history.

@Hank Bank BRRRR is probably want you want to do.Buy, Renovate, Rent, Refi, Repeat.Before you go all in and either find out you don't like being a landlord or you make costly mistakes, start with just the next one.You'll have some challenges with tapping the equity in the townhouse:1) What loan amount can you qualify with your credit & income?

Have you ever heard of a Landlord being sued by a Tenant and losing property?

Double check your lease, all the legalities and still check with the landlord....

Pull your tenant-landlord laws for your area and arm yourself with as much education as you can about being a first time landlord. 

RentRedi claims to be a system built by landlords for landlords and I have to disagree.

Most small landlords will choose $1,000,000 in liability coverage, but in my experience, you can ask them to increase this. 

In our experience, the #1 mistake landlords make when selecting a Property Management Company (PMC) is ASSUMING instead of CONFIRMING.

This is the heart of the reason housing isn't mroe affordable, that landlords bear these types of costs every day.You could probably find cheaper labor, especially to haul away the junk, but not easily as an out of state investor.