@Erlson Neba Much less stress and headaches than rentals especially for lower end areas where the ongoing maintenance will most likely diminish any return you may hope to make and where appreciation cannot be expected.

I expect that the Fed will drop rates next week and will continue to do so.

.- Ball park ranges - what can I expect the cost of this process to be?

Expect higher turnover as people renting rooms tend to move.

Rent out to roommates so I employ the "rent by the room" essentially.Pros:insane cash flowif your room offer is much better value than other places to live, tenants will stay awhilea small community can be built when your tenants become friends with eachothernever ending supply of tenants (at least in my area)Cons:CAN BE management intensiveWILL BE management intensive until you gain experience and know how to manageIf you employ this strategy, the BIGGEST risk/liability mitigator is being VERY clear from the start about your expectations and that you will evict if new tenant doesn't follow your rules.With my setup - I furnish the rooms and have all utilities covered. 

Not saying that those are possibilities but understanding those potential outcome and doing what you can on the front end (screening + clear expectations) to avoid them.  

The plumber will likely have to cut open the ceiling to confirm and make repairs, so you can save a little money by learning how to do that yourself, confirm the problem, and then call the plumber for repair, then patch the ceiling yourself.As Jonathan is trying to point out, it's important to expect these things and have funds on hand to deal with them.

I don’t expect they were trying to sell you something you don’t need.

Find out what they offer as far as education and support, what their fees/splits are and what their expectations might be.Remember, you will need a certain amount of continuing education hours, and you will want a Brokerage that has the support you need to help you through your contracts and answer questions.

If they do not qualify because of poor credit or income issues compared to being self employed etc there are differences - but typically people don’t qualify due to poor credit and people will seller finance to these borrowers thinking they woke up at a holiday inn and got a finance degree when in reality they repeat their past mistakesRemember the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result