The majority of buyers appreciate the expertise that a good agent provides (local market knowledge that can only be gained by being active in the market buying and selling all the time, looking at most of the new listings in person or at least online daily, a background in or at least understanding of building construction, relationships within the network of professionals in the industry doing deals, vendor referrals, legal protection through E&O insurance and keeping up with constant changes in approved contracts and required disclosures and forms, negotiating skills (the average person is terrible at negotiating directly and has no desire to, I find Americans are uniquely averse to negotiating and prefer to outsource it but I digress), etc.).

In my experience, most of the online calculators are just taking an educated guess for you.

It seems you are falling for the alarmist rhetoric you’ve been reading and watching online.

Go to Etsy and search for "rental property tracker," and you will find hundreds of nice spreadsheets to track 10-20 rentals, usually for under $10.Software has extremely helpful features like online payments, marketing syndication (click a button, and your property is advertised on multiple sites), electronic document review/signing, maintenance tracking, and owner reports.

Check out online foreclosure auctions in your state too, it is a great place to check out any deals.

The honest answer here is in this marketplace not knowing what you're doing the risk is high.Knowing what I know now on the forums is totally different.

Land Investing Online.

Even though I myself have a S8 rental, what you hear online is completely false.

I’ve got that Arizona license #AZ-21837, and I lean on a pretty wide network of top-tier realtors and boots-on-the-ground pros who can give you insights you might not find by just browsing listings online.

A tough thing we've found though (like you mentioned) is even the highly rated foundation folks in our area -- as well as a lot of the content online -- all have a strong incentive to sell big high-margin solutions.