Secondary to that is what @Ryan Murdock mentioned where owners routinely wish to keep deposit funds they aren't entitled to and then the PM is left to face the tenant and courts alone.

If you're strictly looking for cashflow, then any of the mid-sized cities in the Midwest will work quite well.  

I wasn't falling for their routine but was considering them.

I am strictly looking for cash flow.

You must understand what they need and will consider as the norm before you can ever sell them on your abilities of being creative and increasing value in any transaction.We have a lot of "pitch" men or women in real estate, we have the get rich gurus, deal makers and many will use a pitch or slogan like, "find the deal the money will come" but that's really not true. 1. real deals are made, not found and 2. they generally lack entrepreneurial skills as they follow a system or routine, they don't really understand what is in the box before they try to think out of it.The fact is, you need to learn real estate, understand what it is that you have to offer, where value comes from for what you have to bargain with, show and demonstrate your knowledge, your entrepreneurial skills.

Not everyone has the stomach for that market, but we're learning every day and still moving forward with it.I'd like to also point out that for the first 5 years of our investment plan in STL, our strategy is strictly cashflow and for that phase of our strategy we don't really care if those properties don't appreciate a penny in the next 100 years.

How strict are their lawmakers?  

A bigger firm that has other departments, but has a specific RE department, or a lawyer who handles a lot of commercial investment and development deals but is willing to work on residential for investors is your best bet, strictly in my opinion and others may completely disagree, but that way they don't need to do thousands to make a living, so there is often a higher level of customer service, but they also do focus strictly or at least primarily on RE matters.

Strictly using a purchase contract to market properties is not legal unless licensed. 

Maintenance for supplies, routine servicing, very minor repair, etc.