Print it off, study it, highlight it, and keep it handy for reference.At the bare minimum, you should know:How to determine market rent for your unitsHow to set rental criteriaHow to screen applicationsState law regarding due dates, late fees, and the eviction processHow to handle late rent professionallyHow to evict a tenant for non-paymentHow to get rid of a problem tenantYou could easily read those two books, study your state law, and then develop WRITTEN procedures for handling these issues within a month.

I always encourage clients to start by developing their "personal investment philosophy".

For example if you are inexperienced, don't have much time but have capital I would recommend avoiding ground up development for example.

I'm looking for a GC and consultant for this project that has experience developing in the LA area.

It seems a lot of the larger developers are putting up quite a few mixed-use buildings downtown and in the surrounding areas and I don't see that trend slowing anytime soon.

Fortunately I was able to buy my first property around 5 years ago and have developed a significant amount of equity.

I source off-market parcels for some of the development work I do and have had the most success by just calling the owners.

@Tyler Bodi - the parcel that I’m looking at is zoned for planned development so if the city were to approve of more than 4 units I would be set on the zoning side.

@Brett Mason, I've been doing software development for ~25 years now, a real estate agent for ~12 years, and a real estate investor for ~8 years.

I would want at least a 30% margin on a development project like this.