There are other FHA requirements 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.Good luck and let me know if you have any questions as I just went through this process last year.

For example:A 10 unit, $750k property that has $120k CF with $20k in expenses gives you a 13% return.Where a 100 unit, $7M property that has $1M CF with $300k in expenses gives you a 10% return.

If they go down, no sweat, they were inexpensive to start and they make money.

Like, if I'm buying a small house in a kind of so-so neighborhood in a relatively inexpensive part of the country, could I assume that maybe my cap ex costs would only be x% of what he's offering as averages?

granite is so inexpensive you can pick up slabs as low as $100 bucks .Granite is the new laminate ,shop around at some of the big wholesale stone places and find a  tile guy thru your local reia group ,laminate is not durable .

I don't have experience....is there any inexpensive management software and training experts out there to help?

There are other FHA requirements 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.Good luck and reach out to me with any questions!

My portfolio is doing very well and my lifestyle is fairly inexpensive, so I'm at the point where I don't know the best way to use my cash flow.

But if you can save $10k in expenses you get to a 9.6 cap with 1.69 DSCR which in my opinion is very solid for a good property in a good neighborhood.You didn't tell us about the debt details but with 20% down and a 6% note over 30yr amort.

Even if I would have done a more inexpensive rehab and sold for less the margins would have been similar.