It still seems like I could roughly break even on some of these properties, taking into account mortgage, property taxes, PMI, expenses, vacancies, etc., and I'd certainly benefit from the relevant tax incentives and would be earning equity, which is great—but is that enough?

When I took over in January of 2015, there were over $110k in accounts receivable owed to the community by owners who were not paying their maintenance and the board was not following a clear and consistent policy for sending these accounts to an attorney for collections and for those they did send, not proceeding with the lien and foreclosure path in a timely fashion necessary.

Account ClosedThanks, good advice on both.  

@Ross Ellington,Talk to your accountant to verify that the interest on your home loan as well as the property taxes are deductible.

Also who signs the brokers trust account checks?

Love the advice given by Account Closed.  

(I Only make 22k annually after taxes and I am 20)

This seems like a situation where that would apply.This isn't even accounting for the additional tax benefit you get from "making interest payments" on the mortgage.

(I Only make 22k annually after taxes and I am 20)

OTH if you took that 250K and made some bold Reit moves 10 years ago you would be sitting on well over 1 mil liquid and paying 60k annually in dividends today.