I'll first start with our due diligence materials. but first, I highly, highly, highly recommend visiting www.optoutprescreen.com.

My wife and I started saving and building our credit a year and a half ago after talking to a lender to figure out our trajectory to buying our first property.With our credit score in the high 700s and our savings just over 35K we reached back out to our lender and got a rough estimate of where we stood as far as borrowing power.

All of my cycling friends are highly motivated people.

Ask to see a copy of the lease and look for the length of lease, current rent amount, tenant obligations like paying for utilities and adhering to house rules and look for Landlord obligations like things the landlord may currently being paying for (like trash and water)Make sure to have an assignment of the lease and clear language on the security deposit WITH interest shall be transferred to the new owner at settlement.Consider tenant quality - what’s their payment history looked like, obtain rent receipts or bank statements from the seller to review on-time payment history.

Very high interest rates, Easy times to find deals with conventional loans and hard times and recently the housing bubble / crash.  

@Alexandra Coryell this is going to be highly dependent on your lender and your builder. 

Are there any specific marketing channels or tactics that property management companies often overlook but can be highly effective in lead generation?

Much like fix and flip loans spiked up to 11-14% for a while, and are now back in the high 9's to 11's, I think it's encouraging to see the terms floating back to closer to where they were before. 

Those prices are high.

Do not paint brick -- low maintenance becomes expensive high-maintenance, no thank you.