Amazon just announced they will be hiring 500 employees ranging from $15-$25/hr which is a great boost to our rental market.

You don't need to spend 50k to learn this business but reading books, reading the forums, networking, joining a local REIA, attending all the Saturday workshops you can find that are under $100 each will boost your knowledge and ability to do this business quickly.   

Taught my 7 year old daughter how to take curb shots of houses from her booster seat in the car, and my 12 year old son wrote down addresses and notes for me.

A lot should not exceed 20% of the sale price on a home, so you can back into that to see what the price range of homes should be in that area.At a higher concentration, you may be required to have paved streets, curbs and gutters, that's an expense for just a few houses.

But, if there is a good spread between your cost of money and the cap rate, then leverage helps boost rate of return.

A developer buys a property for X amount of dollars, and has to put in all the infrastructure to support the project (underground utilities, roads, curb, gutter, sidewalk, drainage, deal with any environmental concerns, soil stabilization issues, earthquake requirements, cost of a neighborhood park, contribute to a nearby traffic signal, etc. and many unforeseen things) ALL of these things add costs to a development.

@Sharon Tzib , I just did one and from filing to curb kick out, it was about 3 weeks, and this was only because it was around the holidays and the constables were backed up.

Here are some more stories...feel free to post others if you find them:Obama declares Fannie, Freddie model ‘dead’US Mortgage Market Overhaul: The Winners and the LosersObama report on Fannie, Freddie plan may boost mortgage ratesIf people are forced to put 20% down on their purchases I am convinced we will be fine going forward.

I know that they will do a set out - which basically means they are there while you clear out the house and set it out to the curb - they will only set people out to the curb, not their stuff.

Curbed(!!!)