And as rates trend lower, more people can afford a new home.

Any tricks? 

Once they opened it back up, we've had our best ever June & July (and August/September trending that way). 

I've learned how to do things right and would love to share some tips and tricks with others just starting out or maybe a hands off investor who would like to get an understanding of something before they talk to a contractor. 

It doesn’t disappear with accounting tricks.

If the ask is reasonable and in line with market trends, I’ll have little choice but to accept.On another note it’s interesting how many parts of the country are experiencing trends of lower rents etc and in some cases sharp decreases as local economies have been impacted but people are fixated on the news articles coming from San Francisco and NYC which say rents are down 5 - 10%.

While I very respectfully disagree with @John Clark that Illinois itself is, as of today, anti-landlord -- it may trend that way (if some current state legislators have their way) and Chicago and Cook County currently are not particularly hospitable to landlords.

Considering the trend in the listing cost (-$50K every 90 days), I plan to submit an offer of $315k to the current $385k asking.  

The trick to out of state is buy a nice building in class A/B areas not the 2% rule C areas you see in rural america, these tend to lose money in real life as cap/ex just destroys you.

We want to build a solid reputation, so we would hate for someone to feel tricked by us.