My simplistic observations for the Houston market, and specifically the West Houston / Katy / Cypress area (since that's where I live), are that one of the Paths of Progress is pushing West out in Katy and beyond.  

From what I understand (to put in simplistic terms):Lenders (could be banks, financial institutions, private people) lend money to borrowers for purchasing properties.

Simplistically, talk to multiple property managers about what types, configurations, locations and rent ranges that will attract the tenant pool you want to target .

While I will concede that this ‘back-of-the-envelope’ analysis is a tad simplistic, I think a trend established using thirty years of data is compelling.

@Bryan Otteson: The 401K plan itself can have options and one of the options is Safe Harbor option, but all employees must get a contribution from the employer (generally 3% of their gross income -- yes again I am being very simplistic here).

@Zach Simpson I think the notion that having a longer term lease to prevent vacancies in the dead of winter is fooling oneself is rather simplistic thinking.

Also, the Nolo article is extremely simplistic and not worth much.  

I'll give a simplistic example using smaller scale numbers/properties-Assume  5 properties  with $100,000 net income form these properties. 

If the answer to the second question is more than $10K above the answer to the first question, it's probably a good investment.That's a very simplistic way to look at it, though...In real life, unfortunately, you can't just look at each component of the rehab in a vacuum like that.

Not because what he says works, but because he explains things and theories simplistically and then you have a base of knowledge for the more technical material in McMillan.