I really appreciate you explaining the tax deed process and strategies in a broad sense.

Also remember if you don't do one and close, and then you come to find out there is an environmental issue - you basically won't be able to easily unload the property without taking a loss.The extent of monitoring and remediation is very site specific - it's difficult to broadly state "it's always expensive to remediate"  But to know how much it will cost to remediate costs a lot since a Phase 1 + Phase 2 can cost upwards of 20K or more depending on the size of the site and study area. 

Let's assume they hit the top end of the savings spectrum & that the property rented for $950/mo.Original Investor "Savings" Amount $2,000.3 additional months of lost rent waiting for vacation time -$2,850Round trip flight from California to Cleveland. -$600Additional month of lost rent due to owner doing job slower than contractor -$950Short term rental in Cleveland for 2 months. -$3,000Two months of missed pay at work (Assuming investor makes a modest $250k/yr) -$41,666Additional money paid to original contractor to fix stuff that owner found out wasn't as easy to fix as he thought -$1,500Additional month of missed rent waiting for original contractor to finish the stuff that owner found out wasn't as easy to fix as he thought -$950Actual Investor "Savings" Amount -$49,516.Yup, in an effort to save that $2,000 the investor winds up loosing a total of $49,516.

@Thomas S-- passive investments is a pretty broad category.

If housing prices go down or don't rise at the rate of broad consumer prices your equity will lose purchasing power.

RE investing is very broad as you know.  

I work with a decent spectrum of designers during the day, and a typical logo like this would cost a few hundred to a few thousand dollars.

You can sit in cash and earn zero or you can be forced out on the risk spectrum just so you can keep up with inflation or your benchmark.

Chief among these are the Conditions (item 6) – obviously an overly broad due diligence request that enables me to wiggle out if the “real†numbers or facts point in that direction.

@Steven Myers  I have a broad knowledge of the overall world of paint but much of my depth of knowledge is with PPG (Pittsburgh Paints).