Hello BP community,While driving around my area, I came across a 3 bed 2 bath house with the ideal characteristics of a home to target with direct mail: overgrown grass, stained vinyl, crinkled blinds in the windows, etc.

I am 15 min by Uber in straight line from Chicago Theater and Prudential Plaza.

That would be okay, except they didn't unhook the water line to the ice maker, pulled it, and now there's a leak. 

I like Avondale, Logan Square and Humboldt Park areas where you can find 2 bed units around $250,000 that will rent for $1700 - 1900. 

On a 1099-R, Box 1 for "Gross distribution" is basically "income" on Line 15a of the 1040, right?

Keep plenty of cash (or highly liquid, safe securities) reserves - I keep a minimum of $50k for my 10 units.Your cash flow is first line of defense.

Contact your insurance provider and see what they will cover and the cost of that coverage before considering purchase.Unfortunately a pool has a negative impact on the bottom line not positive. 

The distribution centers recently built by Amazon and U-Line on the I-94 corridor are gigantic.

@Curtis Rouse Thank you for sharing your calculations, there are line items I did not account for in my calculations and will employ these!

Lining the loan up afterwards is similar, there is no time crunch for closing and gives you time to search for best funding. other than that, you can search for better rates but you'll be within .25% of that most likelycongrats!!