But in my mind, spending time to buy properties which cash flow - completely disregarding any potential appreciation - is a similar kind of "safety insurance".The danger I think is when people come into the market because they think "real estate is going up" and they expect appreciation, without looking at fundamentals (cash flow).It's the real estate equivalent of someone looking for a hot stock tip - they want the rewards without being willing to do the work of educating themselves, doing real investment analysis, and choosing their investments carefully - the "stupid money" as you said.Right now it seems that values are coming back, but real incomes haven't risen, it's really driven by a little more demand due to people feeling their jobs are more secure than a few years ago, combined with still-tight supply.I think what we're going to see over the next few years is that builders will step up to the plate and do a lot of building.

I'm sure eventually I'll be using a combination of strategies depending on the situation, but right now I'm in learning mode while also trying to network & save some money for my first deal.My hobbies include music production and listening to podcasts that deal with online business (i.e. 

I'd focus on renovating to reduce expenses (repairs and vacancy) rather than to increase rents.Rents are based about 50% on location, 40% on the size of the unit, and 10% on everything else combined.

Or maybe you want to do a combination or start with one strategy and grow into another.

I like to copy what the large national builders are doing in my area as far as colors combinations.

Any combination of the above or anything else you want to research.

It is a combination of all vacancy factors (physical, loss to lease, collection, concessions, non-revenue units, etc.)For example: your subject property rents for $600/mo/unit and consists of 100 units (for simplicity of math).

My first 3 deals I did with a combo of hard money and the same lender did a bridge type loan for a combined 92% LTV on the purchase price and I went out of pocket for the fix up and payments....... the first 3 were all around $200,000 so I ended up having up words of $65,000 in each deal.The next 3 I did with a 80% ARV loan that is very expensive but finances 100% of the purchase and the fix up with no payments for the first 105 days..... so big leverage and a little less yeld but you can do more than 1 at a time for a small among of cash.The newest one I have is 70% of ARV with 2.5 pts and 11.5% interest.  

My specific goals: My short time goals is to place my house (was my primary  residence for two years) as a rental, and I buy a another income property this year (perhaps another SFR because I might not be able to fund the 25% down payment on a multi-family).My other specific goal to obtain $8,000 of passive income a month in 5 years, using a combination of SFR and Multi family units.

Keep in mind that they might combine your personal income and expenses with your business (rental) income and expenses to calculate this ratio.