Podcast 106 is also a great one to listen to, and it features an investor local to the Greater Seattle Area.

The cheaper CA cities I’ve looked at (Fresno, Bakersfield, etc.) have high unemployment and crime rates.

I'm currently unemployed since I decided to fully invest my time into Real Estate.

But the most appealing feature is they are replacing everything thus hopefully eliminating maintenance cost for a few years.

My thought is to walk toward the best selling feature of the house (usually the kitchen) if it's close to the entrance, then let the tenant (or buyer) pick the route unless they come off like they would like to defer to you.

Then we can check the safety features of the heater and make sure the tenant is using it properly.

So if they also make you do that every three months, then I think that feature alone would make me choose to never use them.

If agents in your area host "Brokers Open Houses" (open houses for brokers, not for the public), attend as many of these as possible.You'll get to know property styles, features and be better able to understand local pricing.You should also practice running comps on different properties, so you'll be more ready when you need to do one for a client.Best of luck!

The right kind of water feature can be quite loud, but really lovely to listen to and it will drown out the music.

Buy the featured listing package on realtor.com and take 36 pictures of every listing and do a virtual tour so they come up first on every web site.