I am even building a software tool that bridges my two passions...real estate and technology :)  The tool intelligently and automatically sources awesome deals for real estate investors and I would love my fellow BiggerPocketers to check it out because I am building it to help not only myself, but others too! 

Also technology is incredible, Skype is a great tool to utilize and acts as a face to face with service providers such as title. 

The one other thing I will mention is that in today's day and age, with all the varied communication tools at our disposal, you are no longer limited to having a CPA in your direct market.Regards,

As agents, we have really good tools, though.As a rule of thumb, (assuming you are looking at SFR properties) set the criteria as close as possible to the comp properties features, stay within a mile radius, and go back six months.

Subjects can be your friend, both to protect you and to use as a negotiating tool sometimes.  

(On the other hand, the report I saw *claims* that the box has power-failure and tamper sensors - maybe just a tilt switch, maybe an accelerometer - so this trick may be a little harder to do.)

@Bryan Sowieja  well not a popular thought but its realistic.having owned a bunch of rentals in Mississippi we get some pretty large tenants in those areas.And special toilets are required along with reinforcing sub floor below.. and they can wreak havoc on plastic tub shower combos... can't comment on if you can exclude them. but if you rent to folks that you know are quite heavy no matter there physical type  IE professional athlete  power lifter.. cage fighter  WWF or whatever... you do have certain realities in the bathrooms that need to be addressedI have had more than one 400 lb plus tenant have the toilet give way on them during the act. 

From what I have gathered by trawling on the internet and other blogs, Big Pockets has been an extremely valuable tool for its members and I hope it works out the same for me as well.Cheers,Tanmay

The 1 or 2% rule is a screening tool only to help you decide if a property is worth a further look or not.

Hey Rick,I was online looking up reviews on SSU and I found your post....I am a huge fan of BP and I use the podcasts as a learning tool all the time.I am curious as to what you decided to do since your post?