Yesterday, tenant found listing on furnished finder and made specific requests and they were hoping to get in that day, so I told them they could deposit cash in my bank and I would email the lease directly, which I did.

No specific amount but it will definitely be noted when doing comps .

My view is the rehab budget needs to be about 50% higher.  

As for picking a specific market - I would go after one with an increasing job and population growth.

For instance, in Dallas or Houston, there are specific areas that are best to steer clear of.

Are you Dallas specific or anywhere the deals are in the area?

Specifically, there's job growth (Intel, Honda, Amazon, Nationwide, etc) and the population is growing (unlike Cleveland or Cincy).

So a phase budget would be needed to say exactly.

Establish specific objectives for wealth building, financial independence, or passive income.

First thing I would consider starting out is identifying which specific neighborhoods within those cities.