Half a year later, here I am introducing myself to you all after having read more books than my previous fifteen years put together and devouring every resource I can find, including no less than half of the BP podcasts (almost all played at 1.5x speed; thanks for that epic Quick Tip @Joshua Dorkin and @Brandon Turner).

From a high-level that process is: - know your goal and reason why - know the terminology - know how to run the #s - know how to find the good market and submarkets - build a brand - find team members - find investors - find deal - do right due diligence on deal -  close and do asset mgmt Investing in someone else's deal will be a little helpful just to see the process but I think the better approach would be to align yourself with the right people to help you work through the process I outlined above. 

Other than that, you still need to include insurance (interior coverage), power/water, property tax, mortagage. 

Most states include things like abandoning a job, requiring certain information on contracts like license numbers, estimated time to start and complete, description of the job, etc.

Because your principle and interest payment is probably hovering around $2,800/month, not including property taxes and insurance, maintenance and any allowance for capex.But forgetting about cashflow, your return, even if had NO expenses or payments of any kind would be around 3.6% based on a valuation of $1.3m.  

welcome my fellow Louisianian, wish you the best of luck within the BP community, please utilize the platform to spread your brand looking forward to hearing about the wonderful things that you have up your sleeve in the lake charles area!.....

Along with a credit report, I have read that other documents for a rental application should be included.

So, I'm thinking that I can get this property for 57K to 60K and fit 4 people including myself in there.

I read a few books including Brandon's book "Rental Properties Investing" and on paper looks doable.

@David Wei @Fred WendlandSome local meetups worth checking out include...http://www.meetup.com/Investor-Underground/http://www.meetup.com/REALESTATEinvestormasterminds/https://www.meetup.com/texas-real-estate-Investment-Education-Training-Networking/.Also, join the Investor Underground - Austin group on Facebook.