However, has the value of these areas also risen to a degree where other routes for acquisition are cost effective?  

Panama is 9 degrees north of the equator so it has perfect weather year round. 

Perhaps you will find that useful to some degree, although you are well beyond the basics and obviously able to stack up a ton of cash. 

Stessa is great for the accounting/banking experience, but there can be a lot more to the management portion like you described.I of course have a personal bias for our platform, Marble, which includes all of the features you may be looking for to a certain degree.

You don't need a college degree or experience to get started.

I dont know if I qualify as someone to give advice as I am so new at this but having tried with varying degrees of success stock market investing and ...well 8% ROI is the historical returns, so my target was 12% cash on cash returns for however much money I put in the deal (1% a month) going in.

State dependent, but if its at all possible to NOT have you in charge of utilities, then DON'T...... if you pay for everything, they will have the AC set at 65 degrees and run the water ALL the time.... with no "skin" in the game, they will go crazy

Same issue but to a lesser degree with my annual insurance payments that happen other times of the year. 

I know there is some loop hole in the tax law that if you were forced to move due to a loss of a job there is a degree of tax write off, however given that I have sold a home and taken advantage of the tax write off within a two year period Iam not sure that applies.What is my best option here?

And find some that do 24 hrs service in case your guest calls you at 2am saying the heater isn’t working and it’s 20 degrees outside.