It sounds like you may want to nail down your plan and refine it further and explore the most effective avenue for your goals.

But we had some of the issues you noted, small things are big in the eye of an inspector, we had one item I missed entirely, posts for the deck on the house were not bad, but were discolored and getting damaged.

Sounds like you're on the paid staff.Sounds good, there is a great lack of understanding of reality, business and economic cycles, property management, effects on properties long term.A paper tiger of sorts, let me know how over leveraging works for you 20 years from now. :)

FM generally claims to have gotten an appraisal (or some sort of valuation) prior to listing and adjusted for damage, repairs, etc.

Think about what is most (cost) effective and that will probably be giving the deadbeat a few of those Benjamins for the keys.

If you get a renter to do a 6 month lease they could do damage to the property and you have to spend thousands to get in sale ready condition again.

Not to say that is a bad thing, but it has not been effective for me.

Nothing else matters you can always change management and repair damage but you can't change the location.Unlike a lot of cities Memphis has many areas where values are falling or permanently stagnant so you have to be careful where you buy!!

As to his effectiveness as a 'teacher'...http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?

If I just replaced a roof for hail damage and insurance paid the full amount (they did not, there was a deductible) - does that negate the depreciable aspect of the capex?