Short-term cycles should have little effect on the buy n hold investor that is not over leveraged. 

Of course, it depends on the property condition, market cycle, neighborhood, location etc. but assume there is some conservative guidelines that you may be using for the preliminary go/no-go analysis.

You may not find the appreciation of other markets, but in the rental game stability has a value.No matter what point in the cycle we are in, In my experience, if you have the nicest product available in a given class you will have no problem filling units.There are plenty of folks who deal in low/no income areas of the City, as the majority of the residents rent.

And in particular, if you can generate the same cash flow and have similar operational costs I'd be very tempted to follow through with your plan to 1031 back to SD and get ready for the next period of growth.The most effective move would be to sell as TX tops and buy SD at the end of the stagnation cycle. 

To answer your question directly, you start making money after you go through the cycle 2 or 3 times. 

This certainly isn't as "sexy" as owning a bunch of properties on your own that you have full control over, but I can tell you after doing around 10 of these deals and having a few go full cycle, it is definitely sexy to make money passively without having to do anything. 

They are out there in any market cycle in almost all markets. 

You will have to hold for next up cycle which could be 7 to 10 years.My clients sell now to access full equity and then buy in other states at higher cash flow yields.

You may find that you can't get the cash flow you can in other cities in a short time period like that, and you may find that we are at the top of a cycle.

I just think it'll be five years from now. the monetary policy of the USA basically requires more than the "target" inflation over the next 30 years, and money in motion does pretty good at that. but that 30 Trillion won't come without a few more boom/bust cycles, and I don't see the spending slowing down significantly in the next 20 years.