I have no problem with an appreciation play, but not when you have to add square footage & spend an additional 100k to make a profit.

These areas all bring in good rents per square footage but the parking or lack there of or distance to metro north or condition of the neighborhood start to play a role.

I found that in the Greater LA Area, in a given neighborhood or community, house price is usually determined by two factors: (1) the square footage of the house and (2) the condition of the house.

Hopefully there are pictures to help but you want to look for similar 5bd/5.5 ba, close to the same square footage, age of the home and keep in mind other extras that others propertys have or don't. then look at the spread in price.

You can buy 2-4 unit and add units [up to 4] with an FHA rehab loan with just 3.5% down - Your biggest cost is the land so if you can squeeze more sq footage the better. ie: Buy small duplex on large lot, convert the duplex into one unit and add 3 more etc. or similarie: Buy 5 unit and convert down to 4 units - this might be hard to get within qualifying loan parameters but worth looking at, I have done a few of these and it worked well.ie: Buy 2-4 units and add an ADU -its allowed not sure if anyone has done this yet 2.

Might want to add home square footage, but that is pretty complete.

There is a house in the area that have the same square footage that went for 470k in the but the lot size is only 20,000 sq ft.

The rules are pretty intense in terms of actual square footage you can have and that you can't rent "an entire unit", just a room in your house... 

Buy on fundamentals like location, quality, square footage, yard size/slope.  

@Ray Johnson  Compared to its comps this property has 1 less room slightly small square footage.