Hold the tenant accountable instead of rewarding them for bad behavior and pushing your problem onto another Landlord.

But if I manage to find a way, at 12K a month in payments, I'm looking at basically 200K a year in spend with my personal expenses added on top or about 2-4K in cash rewards each year. 

Any place can be safe for investment if the risk and reward is right. 

However, it's important to carefully consider the rental market in the area where the duplex is located and make sure that rental income will be sufficient to cover your expenses.It may be helpful to consult with a financial advisor or real estate professional to get a better understanding of the risks and potential rewards involved.

That this is a time for professionalism, to utilize focused analysis and those using such will be rewarded with "discovery" of the deals, while those using the lazy-shotgun-approach forged by last "EZ" years investing, will be most likely be punished for such. 

@Clint Vonburg,As someone who has done this many, many times over, let me just say-- it's a high-risk, high reward strategy.     

@David Campbell it comes down to risk reward.

It’s certainly very rewarding.

It’s so much more rewarding building your own portfolio.

Ask for $1,000 I will ask you about the Reward.