Bobby the real estate market cycles locally in every market.There are average times that this takes place.For example so long for the market to be stable,so long for the market to increase,and so long for the market to decrease until it hits rock bottom.The pluses right now are lots of motivated sellers in many markets.They held out for a few years thinking things will get better.Now they have accepted it will be a long haul and are ready to sell.Holding out for 2 or 3 years is one thing but 7 to 10 years is too long for many for a property to recover.The plus side is interest rates are low and pricing is great.The downside is liquid capital needed for a regular loan is steep as loan underwriting is tight.If you wait lending might relax with less down but interest rates might rise along with sellers expectations of selling price so you would be at a wash or worse then when purchasing now.The name of the game is too hold onto cash and leverage into a good deal.In the down cycle you buy up as much as possible.

These are areas where the growth is steadily increasing in multiple economic factors: rising population, industry success, job rate growth, and decreasing crime rates.

When we looked into it, the $30-40k that we were going to apply to it would only decrease the payment by a couple hundred dollars a month.

The cap rate is NOI (net operating income)/ Price of the property.With Leverage (calculated over 1 year): (NOI-(Cost of the loan))/($ down) = Leverage Adjusted Cap Rate or COC (cash on cash return)Depending on the interest rate of the loan, you can have a decrease in leveraged cap rate or an increase. 

Being local to the Northern Virginia (NoVA - WashDC suburbs) markets, the prices are relatively high and generally out of my $275k pricing budget.Originally i was looking for a condo in reston and other desirable areas (arlington, vienna, etc), however the condo fees can range from 200s to 600s+/mo. this will likely decrease the cash flow and therefore may not work.  

While it may be a bit counter intuitive there is such low supply that despite the increasing prices the total dollars has decreased. 2) As everyone else has said, house hack if you can in any way scrape together the funds to buy.

too much to explain here, but a deduction doesn't decrease your tax directly. 

Neither of you would want this.I would then have an eviction attorney serve the proper (3) or (5) day notice or whatever is appropriate, and do so over their letterhead so that she knows you're ready should a cooporerstive move-out not occur.In future, have a separate and distinct document signed that decreases the seller's cash due to delays at a rapid rate.if the value of rent is $100/day, double or triple the potential damages should your next seller delay.I figured out some time ago that people are going to do what they want to.

This is not to say that multifamily can't have big gains, because it is very possible to drive up rents, decrease expenses, or add extra flows of income (such as laundry or extra storage) to a larger multifamily which pushes up the price of that multifamily apartment complex.  

I think homeowners are willing to go down in price once they know you have a cash buyer (list) if it's about a 5% - 15% decrease.