If you have $40,000 in the bank, you shouldn't spend more than $30,000 of it.

I agree with Adam that there's not enough information here to say who is at fault.If you are spending all your income on maintenance after three years, then I would say you are being cheated by the PM or you bought a real dump.Personally, I would suck it up and find an expensive, but reliable, contractor to visit the property with me and make an assessment of what needs to be done to fix the property and stop the bleeding.

After that property I never lost any money and did all real estate by the numbers with and exit plan and verifying all.

However, there are more factors than just pricing, the value and strategic planning needed to help you cross the finish line.

Would rather not have to spend so much time myself on the next project.

What if you spend six hours working on this and come up empty?

This city is experiencing rapid growth, with many large companies planning to move to the area in the next few months, which will result in an influx of new residents and a wealth of job openings.

It sounds more likely that you managed by luck rather than by design over that time, and that's not at all usual for "mom and pop" operations, but they also often end up spending more and making less than they would with a property manager because of poor management.

Full rehab and then plan to lease What was the outcome?

Find out where you like to be and spend most of your time and make a house hack work in that area.