Do you have family and such that might prevent this strategy from being viable to you @Nicholas Lisauskas?  

@Gilbreth Seno An LLC will not prevent creditors from collecting against your personal assets.

It's the areas without sidewalks that aren't already trendy and expensive that would cost the most to develop, killing most smaller projects and ironically preventing increased density.  

My wife and I became "landlords by accident" last month, and fortunately the house has decent cash flow.

and I'll let you know what I've paid and how to prevent this from happening to you at the end of the day, Mike

Truthfully, it can be very close to zero risk if you find a TIC or DST play ahead of time as a solid failsafe will prevent that explosion almost every time. 

I believe the author died last year in a car accident or something.

However, in such a case there are several things that would need to be proven, the difficult one being that the theft by the contractors was reasonably foreseeable by the landlord, such that he could have, or should have taken measures to prevent it. 

Does having one prevent me from working with wholesalers?

I would hope and assume you have in the lease that you may enter with proper/adequate notice if they continue to outright prevent you from making repairs an eviction maybe in order see the former point.Thanks,MH