When the housing market improves, the median home values increase. 

Combined with the price I paid through the auction, they are much higher than market valueproperty 1: paid 100k, owe 170k.

I don't know your market, so I would not be able to advise you, but just consider the sellers motives and make the terms beneficial for both parties. 

To find a house where the seller is willing to sell it to you Sub2 the existing loan you need to do quite a bit of marketing.

Well, have a couple of competitors that are exclusively apartments/dev land for same.Their marketing is targeted at investors along with the mailing list.However, yes, you can get bad/good brokers in the same firm. 

In market's like these, sometimes it's smart to stay cash heavy. 2.

BiggerPockets has a section just for this, Under the BUILD YOUR TEAM tab- then select- MEET UPhttps://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521This is the best way to learn from investors in Houston and what to expect on the market.

I also suspect home prices would initially rise on the first 1-1.5% of cuts, but ultimately fall once we get to the 3-4% range as large  pre-pandemic supply comes back online, compounded by boomer land lords selling realizing the top of the market is in the rear view mirror (at least for them).If you eventually get squeezed on lower rents and valuations as the market normalizes, the ability to BRRR your pandemic era deals will be limited, so how do avoid trapping capital in the deals you already own from this environment? 

Has everyone noticed that the rental market in PGH been especially difficult this year?

If you owned 4 - $100,000 properties - that is $60-100k in market appreciation in 5 years.