. - Follow the advice to maintain the sellers' insurance and add yourself as the primary account holder while moving the sellers to the secondary position.- Engage in discussions with both the escrow company and the TC about the necessity of escrow.

Now $500.36 minus $336.71 leaves you with $163.96 left over to maintain a nice little reserve account for vacancies and maintenance/repairs.

They had had a maintenance contract and kept it maintained .

No firm is going to maintain a renovation mortgage department unless it pays for itself. 

They have painted the apartment professionally with great colors, installed a permanent stone fire pit in the backyard, maintained the deck and kept a clean yard.

Keeps pet odor (the ones they say they never have) easy to maintain.

I am looking at a well maintained duplex listed for $360K.

You cant just get a brokers license instead of a salesperson license.You should also factor in the costs of maintaining a license and measure that against how many peoperties you will realistically buy each year.

FYI - the renter in House #2 is my disabled father.....So I must give him a house to live in.So I can leave him in House #2 and maintain normal rent-mortgage, or sell the house and move him into the House #3.I lose the cash flow, but I cash out the equity in House 2

There's also no condo association to fine the other unit's owner for excessive noise, failure to keep the exterior and yard well maintained, parking a dozen junk cars in the yard, etc.I *hate* the location.