I would definitely advise taking a trip if this is something you want to be serious about.

I'm sure you have done your research, but make sure you have a few areas in mind to checkout before you get into town to make the best out of your trip.

Drinking may have been involved on either side or both sides. the maintenance guy does visit his mother there pretty regularly, and tends to combine these two tasks into a single trip.

Not impossible, but if you end up having to get HVAC for example from Sherman, they're going to add a nice trip charge.You could look also at Anna, Howe, Van Alystene, Sherman, Denison. 

If you plan to use FHA loan, it will be MUCH easier to get a 2nd loan approved in the future when going from 3 or 4 unit to moving into a Duplex, as opposed to going from a Duplex to a Trip/Quadplex.- Unless you find an amazing turnkey multi-family deal, capitalize on forced appreciation.

The dates are flexible, and I was hoping to have my trip coincide with any events going on in the area.  

No, of course not.Let's say your trip is for 14 days and you spend 2 full days working on the property.  2/14 (about 14% of YOUR travel expenses - not your children, not your spouse) would then be deductible.Now let's say your trip is for 14 days and you spend 30 minutes every day working on the property. 

In March and July here in Texas when things were shutdown, AirBnB automatically refunded 100% of the trip to the guests.

I was trying to plan a family trip to Yosemite and wanted to stay at an AirBNB.

@Jason Matthews it's in Brooklyn so you'll tend to find everything fairly near by unless you're looking for something specific like a whole foods then you're looking at a 15-20 min drive, a 30-40 minute bus/train.Part of the deal already has approved plans attached so we based the construction pricing on that.