What seems intuitive to us (opening new lines of credit) can actually be detrimental from an underwriting point of view (lines of credit are too 'young').While I wouldn't go as far as @Josh Caldwell and say your credit is "irrelevant" I do agree with the principle that conventional lending is not the only way to get into your first property.  

The property management may or may not be a major component of the income strategy of the operator depending on the goals of the business.

When the irony, is they probably would have already had offers and closed on the house if they hadn't cut out a huge swath of the buyers by insisting on cash only.Maybe it's just my area, but I see poorly written, detrimental ads all the time for real estate. 

Like any relationship trust is the main component to make it successful.

If on the east coast, you will need to repaint the home and replace the HVAC system every few years. the salt and sand have extremely detrimental effect on the house and the upkeep.

So there is a livability component for you and your family and then there is the possible investment aspect of the equation.You need to make a sheet and rank them in order of importance from 1 to 5.Many buyers look at houses as investments but in a lot of cases the equity build up is just keeping up with yearly inflation values and you also spend about 1 to 1.5% annually of the purchase price maintaining the property.

Bank Single Point Essentials ($35/month) - never a late payment, I never check the mail4) Tenant reminders: I use boomerang to schedule recurring reminders to the tenant  - i.e. change the furnace filter, winterize the home, etc - I ask the tenant to respond when the task is complete and boomerang will also remind me if they don't respond.5) (Manual and preventative) I automatically replace certain components before their end-of-life to prevent tenant calls if things break - i.e.

Making sure the property "flows" outside is a key component I have personally found - assuring nobody is stepping on toes, encroaching on each other's outside space, or blocking cars in, etc. 

Plus you get a networking component. 

Some have more of a community component while others have more of a 1v1 component.