He extrapolates trends in computing and compares them to estimates of the storage and compute capacity of brains and predicts a cross over quite soon.

I would recommend you find what you feel is a good deal on one investment property and post the details on BP and let us analyze it so that you can gain some understanding on how to predict cashflow and analyze a deal.

I wouldn't predict anything buy continued volatility and uncertainty.

It does not predict profit! 

In general, I have had positive experiences with these tenants and prefer them to standard ones given the predictable income each month. 

In my .7% RTP appreciation is pretty predictable so every time I get $100,000 increase in property value I can count on a $700 rent increase. 

However, the back-end controls were so bad and the HD management of their credit accounts so poor that we eventually ditched it... we now just issue Visa employee cards to our employees instead (with spending limits appropriate to position and that person's responsibility level)If you must deal with someone who is so disorganized that he can't predict costs, the two ways are either to get a HD account or do phone sales with emailed invoices.

One way to predict future trends could be to use your zoning and permitting office.

Is there a website to find more predictive analytics for demographics on communities?

This up cycle will eventually end as well.I have seen some go from 5 million to 1 million in down turn and now back up to 2.5 or so recovering.On the commercial side my developer friends are playing out if the lease up rents are not as strong as predicted and the interest rates go up causing to have to sell for a higher cap then they will just convert construction to perm. and get down payment back and keep the cash flow until the cycle points to selling again.The development cycle and time is kind of like a game of chicken almost.