You’re in an interesting position depending on how long you’ve lived in the U.S.

Unfortunately/fortunately, my clients and I have both been a position where we were armed with tenant reported violations only and acted accordingly and successfully. 

My clients love it here because of the positive cash flowing deals and lots of appreciation potential.

I suspect they add this service to the tax bill but not positive on that. 

This has pluses and minuses.If your property is bulletproof such as no framing - cinder block construction, cement floors, gloss white paint slapped on the walls and a cheap window mount AC, then you are in a prime position to make money with S8. 

In many cases, it weakens the lender's position as they did not underwrite the buyer and an owner-occupant tends to pay better than non-owner-occupants.

Quote from @Michael Challenger: I have no qualms with hard money lending, but I need to learn more about the process and structure to these for typical deals so that I am more comfortable and in a position to reduce my personal risk and risk to investors as much as possible.

Some will be ok in 2nd position and some will not and force you to refinance out the first - but those are options that are probably cheaper than credit cards 

We still see positive cash flowing deals here with appreciation potential at really affordable price points. 

On crime... one positive trend is that APD, in partnership with the courts, has lowered the previously skyrocketing murder rate.