Over the last 4 years I was running a couple of businesses in Chicagoland that sold to the trades.

students deserve nice places to live. we aren't trying to be slumlords but i do realize that students probably have slightly lower expectations than other types of tenants, so i feel we wont need to break the bank in the level of finishing details like we did on our own home but we will provide housing that is clean and safe and attractive. also thinking we can use some creative materials and methods to make the units party-proof. maybe we get lucky and find some long term professors or grad students and don't have to do annual turnover on every unit. even so, i budgeted 8% for property management after watching david greene's webinar yesterday.the heloc would allow for an easy down payment and a nice buffer for rehab, and i have 750+ credit score and good wage earning history, so i think a conventional loan should not be a problem to obtain. a cash out refi might be an option on the horizon if we decide to really crank a proper rehab but the units (from the pictures i saw) are livable as-is.should i be more specific here on the address/market to get better help?

if you can build/network a list of trades and vendors that could help. 

I am willing to trade time for knowledge.

I'm trying to figure out what are the trade-offs of hiring a property management firm vs just doing the initial work myself.

You can do no money down deals in real estate by using creative financing methods.

But I assume you know that and we simply looking to trade profit for easy.

Both properties I have put all of my own money into the down payment and closing costs but have been reading extensively on other methods since it's quite expensive to keep doing it this way.Well, that's the gist of it.

If you're using it to just buy additional property using a BRRRR method, then you would draw down the credit line and pay it back fairly quickly and get yourself back to strong cash flow again.

The response here is a bit late but thought I would share in case helpful for others in a similar situation:The self employment tax applies if you have income from a trade or business (which a facts and circumstances determination), regardless of where in the world that business is conducted.