You say he's "high maintenance" which leads me to believe he tends to cause you issues, so if he says he will pay by X date, still file paperwork as your insurance if he doesn't come through by X date.

Not knowing your housemate can tend to keep folks in their room etcGood luck :)

I tend to go with the darker cabinets (the ones I install are "Chocolate Pear).

The reason I specify these types of properties vs. an apartment community is that they tend to operate a little differently and therefore are often analyzed a little differently.  

I am currently working a full time job/have a young family to tend to and I am limited with being able to drive my streets given time constraints. 

Networking tends to be the end-all be-all answer to many questions about starting out in this industry.

With a M2M tenants tend to be far more forth coming with their plans as they know they are not breaking a lease. 

I too self-manage on the handful of local properties I own, but would turn them over to a good manager (and I know several) in a heartbeat if management started chewing away at my time.We basically see three types of self-managed owners:Landlords with under 10-15 local propertiesThese owners tend to be among the best landlords in our community.  

People with issues tend to accept higher rents because they do not get past the landlord screening for the better lease deals in the market.

"a seller who sells on his/her own" is a FSBO and they tend to push the envelop in RE, which is why many will decline to work with them at all.