@Andrew Lee Check out the  Bigger Pockets Rental Property Calculator which can help you with your analysis and has tips and tricks on how to fill in some of the numbers.

Doing the calculations if you live in an area with tiered electrical charges is the hardest part but you should be able to come up with a spreadsheet to do the trick.

The biggest "secret and strategy" that I ever learned was this:If I wanted to be successful in this business, I had to be able and willing to do things that others either would not or could not do.Since then, I have also learned a few tricks and strategies that I do keep secret to myself, because they give me a competitive advantage.

All lending laws apply to trusts as much as any other entity.Properties in trust can be partitioned by the court and you're subject to all liens, encumbrances and title actions as if it were in your personal name, a trust doesn't block any title action.A trust used as or deemed to be a sham transaction or a ploy to avoid responsibility for bad conduct will probably be more of a problem, I don't think judges like to see sneaky stuff.Equity stripping?

Not the 24 hour trick that we used to employ.Compounding this problem is the relocation of most probate courts to the old county courthouses away from the suburbs (due to budgetary problems).So, for this (and other reasons), my vote is to work this outside of the probate court.

save time shopping around), QuickBooks updates, news, trips and tricks?

I go to a tax update seminar every year and so you'd think I'd have heard if the laws had changed or if this were some tip or trick that could be used.

Or is there more to it like sneaky fees every time you pull money like those "0%" interest credit cards that charge a 3% fee when you do a balance transfer.

In the meantime the trick is, and admittedly this is a constant challenge for me if I'm going to be honest, to be on the lookout for the first kind but don't get so jaded that you forget about the second kind or come across treating everybody guilty until proven innocent as the first kind.

That trick, selecting areas, towns, and neighborhoods,...