You need to approach lenders with numbers ready and a good understanding of how HM works. 

Currently we are doing a bunch of renovations to get the home ready for rent. 

I pray the property is rehabbed and rent ready at this point. 

So our 5 unit multi-family is ready to rent.

I give the place in move-in ready condition: we agree in the lease I get it back that way, unless something just wears out from normal use.People get sued over things they SAY, so I don't SAY much. 

One of those 5 moved to one of our larger houses that came available, and all the rest bought a house.Vacancy hasn't really been very high - 6 weeks in 4.5 years - but the annoyance factor is huge.Other than that, I think what has cost us the most is taking too much time getting the house ready to rent when we first purchase it.

it was ready to go when we moved in.

Like @Tim Herman pointed out, you better be ready with cash reserves if something goes wrong! 

That's interesting I will run that by my CPA  .. loaning money is ordinary income the tax deferment at least what I read is for dividends and cap gains.. did not see anything about getting out of ordinary income or self employement tax.. 

I’ve been searching the web and RE sites, and have found a few places out of state where the numbers look really good for cash flow and CoC return, and I’m ready to start viewing the properties and making the next steps.My question to the community is this; is it better to have my own realtor with me to go through discussions and negotiations, or would it be okay to use the sellers realtor (assuming that is who is listed as the realtor on each site)?