Plus if you paid by credit card you could always dispute if it didn't work..And I think some insurance companies cover food from bad appliance.

A ton of credit cards is not good.

@Brian Pulaski I use classic grey.

Do you have any bad debt (credit cards, student loans, etc.)?

If you have $1200 campaign budget, you have $200 /mo to spend on post cards or letters.

We are not paying for value here, as there is still no 'guarantee' of 'hitting' value, we're just saying "hey, look, this is going to be a tough one..." and giving an appraiser that wants to practice classic high-quality trade-craft (eg, the 70% of stuff they learned during training that they never use, or haven't used for the last 6 years or so due the economics of time) an opportunity to step up to bat and give it a whack.

The classic textbook answer you can give.

Here are four buy and hold classics (landlord books) that I noted in a blog (linked below) a few months back : Landlording (Leigh Robinson), Buy and Hold (David Schumacher), Investing in Fixxer Uppers (Decima, more a fix and hold), Nolo Every Landlord's Legal Guide (did a different title for that press, no interest in this one or any others mentioned here).For my short summaries, see:https://www.biggerpockets.com/blogs/7365/46972-cla...

Put your "we buy houses" yard sign out and grab a few business cards when your out walking your dog.  

Contractor's using 1099s classically have problems going down the Self Employed path, needing X years of prior 1040s and current bank statements to document income.