OR hang tight for many years, raise rents when or if I can and use my other rental property cashflow to weather CapEx expenses. 

Furniture is expensive Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

., population growth, job trends, average median income) and what thresholds you consider when deciding to start looking in a specific area. 

I imagine (depending on the condition of the property) my largest upfront expenses will likely be the down payment and rehab costs.

@Josh Detweiler Syndicating this asset might not  be the usage of your resources because syndications are expensive to setup and run.

but trust me this is not a passive gig at all.Larger homes are definitely more profitable but also risky and more expensive to furnishFor corporate 2 bedroom/2bath is perfect since you can easily rent it to a family of 4 or 5 as well.Take Al Williamson's course or any online course some are very expensive ($2000).   

He sold the business to someone else and I've heard they use actors as their speakers and it's a hard up-sell to attend one of their bigger, more expensive seminars where there is a hard up-sell to sign up for private coaching.All the courses I've looked into are "gurus" trying to up-sell.

Out of that $120k gross income, $50k was eaten up by expenses, leaving $70k NOI.

The answers to those questions should tell us how we need to treat the loan interest.If taxpayer just throws it in a bank account, the regs are pretty clear it is investment interest, which as you well know is itemized and limited to investment income.In a nutshell, we need to trace the cash.Treas Reg §1.163-8T(a)(3) Manner of allocationIn general, interest expense on a debt is allocated in the same manner as the debt to which such interest expense relates is allocated.

The prices here are less expensive then the east coast and your money can go further.