@Ricardo Murph II: This will be one of my main concerns, going to school full time, working part time, & beginning to invest in real estate.  

I know the occupancy rates in Cleveland are high, does the decreasing population concern either of you?

As far as the local governments are concerned, it has to be paid **somewhere**.Hope that's clear...

hello, aleko. i am a home inspector from the western new york area. the old cloth, 2 wire wiring is kind of dangerous, in my opinion. as stated earlier, the cloth gets brittle and can crumble with the slightest of touch. with rehabbing the place, you are going to disturb it, for sure. then, you have exposed wiring. fire hazzard. not to mention, a lot of this old wiring is made of aluminum, not copper, therefore, the heat it will carry without fail is far lesser that the copper type wiring. if you have an overload somehow, and the breaker doesn't trip, you are going to have a fire. the gfi's have to be grounded, thats the whole idea of a gfi. the g stands for GROUND. with the two wire system you have, where is the ground????

There are other FHA requirements, of course, concerning which you should contact your local lender, but determining whether or not a triplex or fourplex meets the self-sufficiency rule is a good place to start as this rule will immediately eliminate many properties from your search, especially in expensive markets like ours.In terms of your questions, I'd say $1k/month is a bit ambitious if you're living in one of the units.  

Do not, do not, do not allowed someone who is not a licensed professional to install the furnace, it will invalidate the warranty.The warranty should be able the same from every manufacturer, so you're pretty much even there.I wouldn't necessarily recommend flex duct, it is cheaper, but you can end up with integrity issues, even in the short run.My best suggestion is to find an HVAC supplier, and check to see what the prices are for furnaces ... this will absolutely open your eyes as far as material costs are concerned.  

Kyle M. you can do that, you can even bill them all together on one bill if you like, just itemize it so that they can see what's going to what.The 'best' way to do it would be to have the water company come out and put an official water company meter in for each unit, but I don't think I have to tell you ... that won't really help your current cashflow concerns!  

I had the same concerns 10 years ago. 

At that price and rent, I would be concerned that its in a lower class neighborhood, and be concerned with the issues associated with renting in lower class areas.As for the flood price, I have a duplex insured for $165k, new construction, built 1.5ft above base flood elevation (BFE), and my insurance was $650/yr, so if your property is in a flood zone, your policy will likely be more than $400/yr.With those rents, it will cash flow even if financed. 

This is my thoughts...Your main concern here is knowing how many times the floors have been sanded in the past, residential application is likely once when installed but if the floors are very old there is a chance they have been sanded down another time.