Keep your eye on RESimpli.

I'll keep an eye out.

Hi Tom, If the 'second home' you are referring to is an investment property, reach out to Victoria Kiser at Eagle Bank  to get a quote compare.   

Be diplomatic, opening up with you want to collaborate with fellow landlords and keeping an eye on each others' property would be mutually beneficial.You can bet if a fellow landlord contacted me about my tenant's dogs I would certainly follow up.

I also am hands on and visually oriented so for my first deals I would like to be able to keep and eye on them as well as to build systems for future management. 

something that helped me was to get a great PM on your side before you pull the trigger (hence promise them your future business), they will keep you out of the wrong side of town, give you realistic area rents and tell you what's trending, meaning what are young families looking for etc...then after everything is in place go the extra mile and spend time locating a local handy man you can pay yourself independently, typically an older gentleman who works for himself, make sure he's not affiliated with your PM, he'll be the guy you send to look at things to make sure your PM is keeping a tight ship, essentially another set of eyes, who can look at the bigger ticket works orders before you order them...so just tell your PM you have a friend who you like to send over to see the bigger issues...for example: i can tell you that i've avoided $4k HVAC replacement orders several times, given some AC people are dishonest...an issue arose at a house they sent the AC people and they wanted to replace ...but I call my guy before doing anything, so my guy goes in and identifies and even fixes a much simpler issue, in 2 cases replacing the Capacitor ...a $30 battery pack that fits onto the outside Unit...that's just one example...cost me $100 all told, these issues will kill your cash flow, and your PM may simply not have time or bandwidth to double check everything etc...

Will keep my eyes open for that!

Might be quite eye opening (either good or bad).

I can imagine that could be quite eye awakening for a surprised investor.  

But as I want to grow, I don't want to lose the handle on what I should be keeping an eye on.