With REI, graduation is achieving your financial (specific...not, "I want to be financially independent) goals.Next, you need to forget about collecting income properties at the start. 

Poor people have low value (to worthless) things, and things that are not are financed.Written into a lease or not, I still think (Trying) to take something of value from these people will result in a physical fight or a gun being pulled.Texas is a hard to collect state, but turning a smoke stained 11 year old big screen into $100 at the pawn shop hardly seems worth the drama/effort/personal risk.Some people will kill each other over McDonalds Chicken nuggets being out of stock--you never know how people will react to this.

REFINANCE LOANLenderOrigin = 2% of new loan amount850 processing feeOtherAppraisal = 6002nd title fee .75% of total loan1 year of insurance upfrontTax proration: depends on when taxes are collected in that area - i get paid taxes that are collected by the seller for the year, i pay taxes for the rest of the year upfront

Some collect your mail and upload it to a portal for you to view.

I’t seems just recently I have really had a hard time collecting rent on time.

As much as possible I'd recommend getting really clear on your goals in life and how real estate fits into those, and then iterate from there.If you are buying at a distance (specifically you're not moving from house to house and collecting houses as you go) then it would be a great simplifying factor to buyer AN asset or two with many doors, but there are other ways you could structure it so that small multis are the way to go.So, back to the root . . . what do you want to accomplish in life, and what role does real estate investing play in that?

Does he have accounts in collections?

For me all rents, fees collected, and other property-related income goes into the Income account and from there is distributed to:Operating ExpensesTax and InsuranceLoan PaymentsOwner PayThis has worked well for me since I instituted it around 3 units in.You could break the distributions into any number of categories that you'd want, but the "secret sauce" to the system is to literally move the money so that it lives in the relevant account and then spend from there.

If this property is in an area where you need a bulletproof vest and a machine gun to collect your rent, I would not buy it.

I do not get any money from TurboTenant, nor am I an owner or investor in the company.They have a referral program where they will send me a $25 home depot gift card for a referral - you don't have to use the referral codeStessaStessa is a website that I use to track all my expenses.It is another free site and you can pull reportsYou even can upload receipts.Roofstock recently purchased StessaCompletely freeZillow Rental ManagerI use this to collect rent.Free for the landlordTenant only pays a fee if they use a credit card to pay rent.