Slightly older housing, and some neighborhoods are better or worse than others, but high growth in Durham overall going forward and cheaper real estate.

This coverage is typically optional and usually capped at $10,000 or $15,000 so you should double check that if you haven't already.

We have debated a couple times whether he would have done better investing in San Diego - we agree to disagree.  

However, if your primary goal is to use it as a short-term rental (like on Airbnb), then lenders will generally classify it as an investment property, which usually requires a minimum of 15–20% down.

We've found that tenants struggle to figure out how to change batteries and are constantly entering the wrong code and temporarily locking themselves out for a set amount of time (usually 5 minutes) until the lock resets.

Most of the time that you see really high cash returns and cap rates, it is usually too good to be true.

The local laws are usually very clear on how a former resident can obtain possession of their property and trespassing unsupervised is usually not legal.  

It sounds like you got a solid deal on the purchase, even with the appraisal coming in a bit lower than expected.I’ve actually had something really similar happen with a property I bought in Florida.

That usually works fine for your first couple of flips.

There are lots of ways lenders make buying hard, but the duplex has a lower bar than 3 or 4 units.