We solve the data problem by working with the industry's best data vendors that have applied a lot of post-processing and enrichment to the original government sources, or have collected their own proprietary data.Not all of those vendors are equal in terms of accuracy, and we learned this the hard way through experience -- I come from the commercial real estate research world, and my co-founder from the retail site selection & revenue forecasting world.

@Kyle J. has a pretty good article on sources to use for pricing once you get done reading it head over to and read: Higher Rent Equals Higher Returns...

I split them equally.

Those trades are vital to any real estate professional starting out.

Census) we can gain additional perspective on the vitality of the area's economy.  

We'd hold title as a 50/50 TIC between my solo 401(k) and my friend personally and each side would contribute equal 50% shares of all equity.

That is not really true because your time spend equals the management expense.

OOS equals higher risk.

This means you take the rent of all the units (including the one you would occupy) X 75% which has to be equal or greater than the Principle + Interest + taxes + Insurance  (PITI).  

I did not invest my own money into this deal although I played a vital role in negotiations throughout the process.