My concern is that the actual people staying in my STRs are going to grumble because nobody cleans their room every day, there's no breakfast waiting for them, no pool, etc. 

I run those blocks every day, i'm not sure you will be scoring rents that high in that area the 1400 for a 1/1 seems much too high imo.

Possible with lots of experience, and a track record of success.Based on the phrasing of your statement, I’m going to assume that your interest in real property investment was piqued by listening to the various fantasy stories being pitched every day, via reality TV, guru internet sites, or how to books.

The crap I see every day from flippers makes me think they have never touched a saw and decided to flip a house themselves with zero input or research.

You have to live far away, tough area, have an in with agents/wholesalers, find the deals yourself, been passed down a book of business, but most importantly work hard and creatively at it every day.

I am in Newark everyday and I see nothing but growth.

I live in a city with huge wealth disparities and a major housing shortage and see the impacts of gentrification every day.

The issue I have with that in owning a vending machine is that the bottler/distributor then has free reign to charge you whatever they want to for their product, which obviously impacts margins substantially.Of course you can always go to Sam's club or Costco or something and buy in bulk to the extent you can, and I vaguely remember talking to folks who do this.Personally, it's not really my cup of tea, however under different life constraints I think it'd work just fine (for instance if I worked every day close to a location I can stock them).

Certainly you don't get such deals every day in MLS, sometimes you may see mis-quoted / mis-caluclated deals on MLS.

The podcasts alone can prove to you that normal everyday people become financially independent via real estate all the time.