There are many online tenant screening services that offer a wealth of blog materials that you could probably utilize to learn more about different areas of being a landlord and screening tenants for the first time.

@Amy Hu all of those things are no less likely to occur in state if you use property managers or contractors- I think due diligence just needs to be emphasized more heavily by people that are utilizing professional services to manage all aspects of their asset.It's terrible to hear what's happened with your PM and contractor.

I compare my services to those of the "competition" and the private Landlord: online payments, solid screening, no evictions in 5 years, over 340 rentals under management, member of NARPM and higher code of ethics, etc.3.

On show 325 at 1:27:00 he mentions a web service (padlock.com) where you can enter an address and buy the owner information like phone number, loans on the property, ARV, etc....   

@Chase Finn I understand the review and I don’t think CE Shop is perfect but I have used so many of the other services that were terrible.

Make sure the agent is knowledgeable in auto and casualty rather than life insurance and financial services.

I know lots of service members that have purchase investment property while being stationed overseas.

Looking for a good credit, eviction and background check service.

@Sonny Sach A good metric to pay attention to along with the IRR would be the Debt service coverage ratio and CoC returns especially if you’re leveraging equity with debt.

Real estate agents and appraisers have access to their local MLS (Multiple Listing Service) and can pull all the recent sales data for a particular area.