Mine was a long time ago so I can't say what requirements/testing would be.

Our goal is to test the investment waters and if we like it, purchase more homes to help with retirement income years and years away.

Sometimes, when a tenant is testing you and they see you won't back down, then it's enough to get them to leave without a fight.

This will give you the opportunity to select a specific geographic area and test out what search terms work in your market.

I am wondering if spending 400 dollars for an online real estate course, and then taking the test is going to be very beneficial to me.

The down side is that we would need to use a property management company, which will end up eating what slim positive cash flow we would otherwise have.Would it be better to hold onto it, even for a slight loss every month, or to try to go ahead and sell it for the loss and take the hit financially and get it over with?

And next time, try changing one element of the post card to test its impact.

Slim sytems.

I think there are a lot of unmotivated sellers testing the waters,  listing their dated home with deferred maintenance at 5% above the nicely rehabbed flip that just sold down the street.  

Not this year or last year, but the long term averages over the last 30+ years, certainly long enough time period to capture both up markets and down markets and being careful not to cherry pick your start or end dates to be an up or down market.If after underwriting with those averages and other reasonable projections you still like the investment under nominal scenarios, then you need to stress test your investment to make sure that under any bad (but still somewhat reasonable) circumstance you have the intent and ability to hold onto this property, or at the very lease have multiple exit strategies to sell at profit if you need or choose to.