Because of rent control from the Régie du logement, rents tend to not increase as fast as in other places.When it comes to single family homes, the cashflow you can get here is not that great.

1-2 hours by train gives you a ton of options, from houses in the suburbs/Bergen County to apartments and multifams in the Hudson County area.You can check out the NJ transit schedules here to see what falls within your commute barrier, or use the google maps public transit option - it tends to be pretty accurate for the rail system, including the PATH.

As the OP said, the tenant's dad is a high-end builder....they tend to come in with the attitude that their 36 old princess daughter now should get all  the trimmings in a rental......a lot us "feel" and see this coming. 

I tend to be risk adverse and thought that wholesaling would be a good area to start getting involved in deals before I considered buying investment property for myself.  

The tenants tend to at lower rents have more life issues and their cash situation can change from week to week.Just do not give yourself the belief that you put a PM in and those types of properties just throw off cash flow with no issues.

@Carey Lilly,Potential as an investment tends to be more about a property's ability to produce income than about a live-in owner's preferences.This may sound a bit hard, but if the numbers don't work, move on.

Some good measuring advice here... and what worked on my fourplex was a really good vapor barrier (over a bare earth floor) with no gaps, even up against wall.

@Natalie OlivoI tend to agree about gut instincts. 

Tell them that you hope to be licensed soon and would like to see what their company offers.The big franchises can be a good fit for some, but tend to have much higher overhead than smaller, boutique firms or locally based companies.

The Hawaii real estate market follows the general economy of the US and Japan, about half of our visitors are from the orient, but tends to be more volatile than the mainland, so picking up something when the market is down will make a huge difference in how you do.