If your lease isn't at least 5-10 pages it's too short and will cause you problems with tenants.

I never thought about saving first before investing  :/  Ironically enough I found "Building Wealth One House At A Time" on Amazon shortly after and had no idea it was also associated with Bigger Pockets.

Very different Counties and you will pay a premium for Howard County...you might look in Savage as it is a bit cheaper than the rest of Howard County...I dont know much about PG County other than it is going to be much cheaper.

It is now cash flowing fine and I was able to extract most of my costs (ended up ~$20k short of extracting all of my costs and that was mostly due to a low refinance appraisal).

I would suggest getting a cash out refinance especially if you are short assets and cash.

In a reasonably short time, you'll get a much better sense of what's acceptable work and what isn't before you give the go-ahead to paint.

@Joshua KohlThe short rule is: you can deduct something that would be deductible if the property was already in operation as a rental.

I short changed myself, lol, but a little money is better than no money.

In the past I've also seen a 6 month iteration of $150-$200 increase since it's so short.

Hello BP,My business partner and I are funding a short-term private lending deal.