I would respond that our Patriot - Founding Fathers were compelled to a revolutionary war because their overseers imposed too many laws that impaired their ability to realize their desired liberty and pursuit of happiness. 

Document your meals to the best of your ability.  

The house is located in South Durham which is seeing a lot of growth recently, and is only about 1 mile from my house.

If so, the postal service offers you the ability to mail to a specific route.   

As an investor event's like this make me stay away from investing within 5 miles.Basically, that means that rent growth is likely to track inflation for the next couple years. 

My goals are to find a MHP with reliable cash flow with the ability to increase cash flow (60% vacancy).

Otherwise, I am not a fan of forced savings - it takes money away from the ability to invest in real estate.But in general, I do agree that "a penny saved is a penny earned."

For apartments I have a handyman that takes a shot at it and then farms it out if it is above his technical abilities but he can usually get it done.

On top of this report, Moody’s Analytics tells that the growth in single-family home rentals will be accelerated.

Here's what you need to check in both...Job creation with projections and median salariespopulation growth projectionsRE trends...avg DOM, median price, # units sold (sweet spot units 3/2/2), etcquality of schools (greatschoold.org)Major employers in both areas (each area probably has an Economic Development Corp that will have a wealth of canned information)anything else you can think of that helps you compare apples to appleIn addition to the above, I would research the sub-markets within each area.