That's strictly a cashflow mentality since he seldom assumed appreciation.Colorado is experiencing major appreciation, so you could lower your payback standards since your profits would come from appreciation.Finishing the basement: Assuming $15,000 to get an extra $250/month, that's a payback of 60 months or 5 years.

My current thought is to look for a small multi-family unit to get started; I'm looking around a cost that is around 60% of my net worth in full - but of course, I'd like to leverage a mortgage so the majority of my net worth can remain invested elsewhere (incl. other properties in the future).My current state (I'll add more as time goes on if folks are posting):* Just got pre-approved for a %5.25 loan from Quicken with 0 points...

It was a major buying opportunity. 

Also, as far as good signs for a market: look for job growth, population growth in the area in the last several years, see how many major employers are there, whether these major employers can sustain the population growth, whether these are the types of employers that will remain for a long time (in demand, like a Hospital or  College), also how close is a town to the large metro, can people get to work under one hour.

There have been people on the BP podcast that have been accused of major fraud.

She owes very little on her mortgage as she's lived there for 30 years.Our house value according to Zillow (since we haven't had appraisals done yet): $620k built 2000, does not need any major work.

He lists other properties but those are the majority of his listings.

Hello fellow BP members, I am a sophomore majoring in civil engineering at the University of Buffalo, I'm 18 years old.

-MAJOR REPAIR, my experience during Texas freeze.

Within this parameter, starting with rents below $1200 a month will keep you from major risk of a down turn.