Above all else, focus on WHY they may be selling and what their pain point(s) are and how you can HELP them! 

For me I wanna dental practice so I want to be his hands off as possible and focus on long-term rentals.I have turned as much of my property management over the property managers and even though I pay them a monthly fee are usually get higher rents by doing so so the monthly fee is pretty much a wash not to mention the avoidance of pain in the butt tenants - that they have access to screening tools that you probably don’t, therefore helping you find only the best tenants possible.I also set up what is called a series LLC and an associate a checking account and run all expenses and income through that.

Definitely a little bit of a pain though, as that's just a Texas thing. 

I feel your pain as far as trying to invest in an expensive market!

I don't care how good the returns look on paper, I always tell my clients that if they won't let the appraiser in and the inspector in to look at the property, then that is a red flag and don't even buy the property because the tenant is telegraphing to you how much of a pain they are.Just my 2 cents. 

(and this coming from someone that doesn't even like agents... but I feel their pain when it comes to working with first time buying investors) 

It is cleaner, more efficient and you avoid delivery which can be a pain if they forget to deliver.

Additionally ask for proof of rental deposits to verify that their pain.

This is a challenge, especially when they have a tendency to screw up lease renewals and not even follow-up with either the tenant or the owner.All in all, the experience with Great Jones has been very painful. 

"That's not to belittle the very real pain that a lot of people did go through, but for the most part, the pandemic was a shorter headwind, economically, than a lot of people were thinking."