Regarding your question: The court in the past have looked at these intents:  The agreement between the parties and their conduct in executing its terms; The contributions, if any, that each party makes to the venture;Control over income and capital and the right of each party to make withdrawals;Whether the parties are co-proprietors who share in net profits and have an obligation to share losses;Whether business was conducted in the joint names of the parties;Whether the parties held themselves out as joint venturers; andWhether separate books of account were maintained for the venture.In more complicated cases, the court has ruled what you are expecting, but there were some significant differences. 

I am very new to the Bigger Pockets web site and podcast and have really enjoyed it.

I love this community and I'm not sure if I would have ever bought the first house had it not been for this site.

Welcome to the site Connor.

Have you done a search on the site yet to find others that are in the city you will be investing in?

I even tried to find a book on Amazon (for Alabama, don't bother), but couldn't get as much info as I was hoping for, especially considering how complicated I'd heard tax sale laws can be. 

Thanks Aziz, So far a great site with awesome members like yourself, mostly American based but good content for learning the skills. 

His rates are much lower and I save the complicated items for the pros.

I got recommendations for CPA, attorneys, property managers...hit me up if you want those contacts.And if you haven’t gone through the course of starting in real state investing (free on this site), that can give you a lot of ideas and pointers.

In my experience, most agents aren't going to be helpful here (some exceptions).You can ballpark these things after getting some data:Rent:  use the sites  you think you're future tenant will use to find you as a landlord (Zillow, Rent.com, a big property manager in your area, Craigslist) and look for similar places in similar neighborhoods.