I’m thinking a large active military and/or veteran population makes it a bit of a different animal than your standard city. 

The area is saturated with people wanting to do AirBNB.Keep in mind that COVID gave a huge advantage to AIrBNB over hotels and resulted in tons of new customers discovering AirBNB.

PMs are great if you're running a larger (5+ doors) portfolio, in a similar area, and have "lived" self-management long enough that you know you're no good at creating standard operating procedures or farming out the work directly.

Based on my projections, I knew that if we put the standard 20% down, we'd have a good chunk of equity built up right off the start, and we'd also have enough, or close to enough, rental income from the other unit to cover our mortgage.

I knew that if we put the standard 20% down, we'd have a good chunk of equity built up right off the start, and we'd also have enough, or close to enough, rental income from the other unit to cover our mortgage.

I took the school test, passed, but decided not to take the state test because I discovered it was not what I wanted to truly do.

Does this imply a break down in underwriting standards?

My company has been using a nationwide report for criminal and credit reports, but just discovered that a tenant that we let into a property has a serial history of evictions.

Your city will have certain standards, and so will your neighborhood. 

You don't have to file the claim but what if later you discover additional serious and expensive damage?