A lot of the general concepts are good to know. 

"Adding value" is a really vague concept, can you be more specific? 

I was preparing a rant but @James Hamling covered it well.Remember the concept of risk?

I am just now starting to learn some new concepts and open to real estate investing.

I am just now starting to learn some new concepts and open to real estate investing.

The whole concept of "passive income" is nuts...there is nothing passive about running a real estate business - even with a competent PM in place.I recommend that you schedule a meeting with the PM and have your homework done beforehand.

I like reading the Wall Street Journal in general.

I'm working on an exec summary length two-page "concept" business plan. 

@Marcel Couch Classes for commercial properties are different than residential 1-4 family properties.Also, you'll find the concept of classes for 1-4 family vary greatly as there's no standard and everyone has different opinions.Our LOGICAL opinion is that it all revolves around the tenant pool for a property.Here's our definitions of Class A-D, with the understanding that we are playing statistics and probabilities (there are always exceptions):Class A: 680+ FICO, white-collar to high-blue collar, very stable career/income, usually some savings, takes very good care of rental propertyClass B: 600-680 FICO, low white-collar to mid blue-collar, stable employment/income, often some savings, takes good care of rental propertyClass C: 550-600 FICO, mid blue-collar to no-collar, decent stable employment/income, lives paycheck-to-paycheck, 50/50 on taking decent care of rental property or being hard on it.Class D: <550 FICO, no-collar, unstable employment/income, often only SSI and/or Secion 8, often doesn't deal with banks, usually hard on a rental property.The tenant class will eventually affect the property, which eventually affects the neighborhood class, which affects the contractor & PMC class willing to work there.An abundance of housing will typically lead to a lowering of the overall class in that area.A shortage of housing will lead to gentrification and improvement of overall class in that area.

Your CPA may need to make adjusting journal entries after analyzing the HUD settlement statement.4.