Historically, once we hit full employment, employers are forced to raises wages to entice new workers into the work force (or get workers to come from competitors). 

Outside of that, I stand by the statement that if I ever hear a negative, it's almost always what I stated above.Taz, to Zach's point; you chimed in without and disclosure of whom you are, you involvement in the industry and positioning as competitor's to whatever degree. 

Here's an example of my first building I made over $1 MILLION profit on: (most of my competitors and my accountant thought I was nuts and the numbers at that time just didn't make sense)https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/311/topics/644570-how-i-made-over-1-million-on-1-deal-after-6-years-of-headaches

We have several local competitors that claim they can manage Class C properties, but we have many owners eventually terminating them to hire us - telling us about all the things that went wrong.In our experience, the #1 mistake owners make when selecting a Property Management Company (PMC) is ASSUMING instead of CONFIRMING.It's often a case of not doing enough research, as they don't know what they don't know!

Developer #1 & #2 are competitors who both buy projects at a 20% estimated return level.

I am also concerned to tell a local PM about it until I am in contract since I notice that they buy a lot of properties too and may create a competitor.  

Listening to all the replies I can see how it could have been bad luck or bad on me for going off realtor reviewsWhen I analyzed these properties I purposely sought out seasoned properties that been on the market for at least 6 months to thin out the competitors.

Greater liquidity in the "Same" market time period.Please expand if I misinterpreted the direction of your question.We do Self Storage, and it can be hard to differentiate value between our competitors and us; since they are both just metal buildings. 

Let's say though most of the tenants have been in the unit for years and rent was 30%-40% below most of its nearby competitors (within 5 mi) but there are places that offer rent in that range but they are 20 mi away (a 40 min drive).

Or look on Sparefoot and see what sizes are turned on, for the competitors near you.