As a first time investor or even a smaller investor its hard to find a level playing field in the Bay Area.

We live in Colorado so we're in the middle of winter right now.

There is a full-time staff of five (excluding owner), and the average employee tenure is around 10 years.

So are you managing it from Colorado?

I'd be prepared to spend about 10% of my profit on marketing, some of that would go to materials/mailer costs, and some would go to paying an employee to do the work.Do you have a recommendation or rule of thumb that has worked for you?

Colorado has a number of government run cabins (which get booked many months in advance) and I have stayed at a few private ones as well.

If 2nd lien wasn't released then it has priority over all other liens recorded after 2nd lien.If the third lien references the 1st lien as an extension (or modification), then it is very likely that either someone made a mistake releasing first mortgage or they released 2nd mortgage.I am sure title co can help you out decipher this 

I noticed a disturbing trend--rentals which are priced at a level I didn’t believe to be profitable are staying on the market an extremely long period of time.After a little digging, I found several neighborhoods which appear to be completely saturated with rental homes.

At the end of each term period the lender will evaluate the progress of the loan and reset it for the next period and reset the interest rate to whatever the prevailing rates are at that time.You should generally get a loan with a lender in the same state as the property.Commercial loans don't have the same level of regulation like residential loans.

You should talk to a local title co/RE attorney.