Educating your potential investor as to the Risks and Rewards.

It has its risks but also significant rewards and provides a lot of flexibility. 

The world of Real Estate Investing can be pretty intimidating but with a little patience and hard work it can be extremely rewarding.

I am starting to evaluate a new market and have been intrigued a bit with Birmingham ( I invested strongly in Memphis back in 2010 and 2011 where you could get in strong / premium owner occupied areas and still generate good cash flow) and on very basic due diligence so far it seems like Birmingham has many characteristis / metrics that memphis had a few years ago before the hedge funds and hype change the risk / reward ratio there a bit.My focus / target for Birmingham would be less the working class neighborhood / formats and more SFHs focused on higher quality (higher owner occupied type neighborhoods, near better schools, rents comfortably over the median rent levels, low crime, etc).  

I am curious to hear what you come across.Like yourself I have learned and not by a get rich book in real estate but taking the plunge and making some bad decisions but I have also been well rewarded by decisions that were in my favor.  

People are rewarded to walk away after non-payment and such. 

Even helping to arrange a short sale would only mean work with no possible reward and only incur lawyer fees. 

Its not a cheap process but can be rewarding. 

In most cases unless you are getting that the risk/reward is not worth it. 

It is all about loyalty and a mutually FINANCIALLY rewarding experience.