I've read books and listened to the pod cast quite a bit, so my question is what advice would you give to someone new that they don't tell you in the books about long distance investing.  

If you're interested in learning more, I wrote a whole book on the subject of finding and hiring contractors.

If it is the same in your area, remember that this will cause problems when you finally do sell. 

To BRRR it would be more like buy a 30K property, then spend 20K doing reno and then have a house worth maybe 80-90K that is paid off and producing income.If you are looking to do this both out of state and as a newbie, two turnkey properties is a clear winner in m book for your situation

Since deciding to get into investing I have listened to about 100 of the bp podcasts and read a few of the recommended books, I’ve taken the classes to get my CT real estate license and will take my exam on Monday.

Just know that you are buying time savings because ALL the information they share with you will be available in books, podcasts, or webpages.

And finally, if they used a traditional P trap, you could buy yourself the extra room for appropriate slope with a low profile P trap.

Well it finally happened....we closed on our 20 unit property in Oklahoma on 5/31 and now it’s time for the complete overhaul!!!

If you are an independent contractor with multiple years operating in your business and reasonable consistency in that income (you don't have one year with $30K and one year with $200K and are trying to claim you make $200K) then you need to keep calling lenders until you get one who can work with you, in my opinion.If my real estate side business and my book royalties from Set for Life (next year) can help me qualify for a loan, in addition to my W2 income, then I don't see why someone with consistent income from self-employment is having trouble -- perhaps the trouble is more in demonstrating consistent income from a sustainable source? 

Read books and listen to podcasts on real estate investing.