Not too shabby for land appreciation.That said, I’d keep an eye on the Elon Effect down southeast.

These things need so much power that unless the site has access to major grid access point you're wasting your time. 

Strong jobs reports had a larger effect on the 10 year treasury, followed by strong retail sales numbers, followed by EU inflation numbers, then followed by election results but honestly election results only affected rates for a couple of days.Lots of pressure on treasuries from the level of debt the US is carrying, but remember the Fed is also still doing quantitative tightening (while cutting rates) which is additional upward pressure on rates.

I don't work on houses, but I have to use B and A-basis values for material strength which in effect means the real material will end up being 20%+ stronger (depend on the material).  

@Phillip Austin I self-manage my properties including some where I do rent by room as a primary strategy, and it is very effective if done well with good screening in place.The difference is starting with shorter leases for me. 

Georgia, a state not mentioned, offers a 20% penalty so if the encumbered deed is redeemed after 1st month your effective rate of return is 240%!

Yep for one especially in the early stages a hard credit pull would not be useful, just have them do soft checks for the time being and opt out of credit solicitation: www.optoutprescreen.com I could be biased... that said typically working with one lender than can help regardless of where you're looking and having a relationship with that will provide the easiest and most cost effective route long term. 

How do they know their investment will not be wasted?

You should just apologize and get a beer or get a beer and fight but this is a lot of wasted BS over $5K   I am not sure what you mean here.

It's not quite the same, but it's actually better because we don't waste time drinking beers and shooting the breeze about football or cars.