Stumbled into a potential buy

[Stephen Shelton]

So I was at my first rental today doing a little touch up, when the neighbor came over to talk with my tenant. In a nutshell, she has her house here and another in Puerto Rico. She kicked out her husband and he fled to the house in Puerto Rico, now they are splitting and he wants the Florida house sold and half of the equity. Oh and he wants the house in Puerto Rico - from what I understand fared the hurricane well. 

So she feels forced to sell but is going to do it. I want another house and can't get over how great it would be to have 2 side - by - side. Not that it's happened, but I worry about neighbor problems. 

It seems like a solid basic house : slab, block walls, single story, post-lead paint construction, and town water (wells are a Pita). It sounds cliche to say but it literally is extremely close to all sorts of stuff - it's got all that and not only does it have no HOA is somehow unincorporated county land. It even has 1 less level of government ruling overhead!

The kitchen would be a gut, but over the 5 years I have never heard her complain about a meaningful problem with the house. 

Her ex mentioned seeing it was worth $125K online which would be a bit tough considering it needs a new kitchen, and even though I've been inside a couple times I don't even know if it's 1 or 2 baths (Zillow & Realtor say different things) 

Oh I'd love to have two contiguous properties!  2 more after that and I can replace them with a hotel, right? 

And this happens the day I sign my docs for my HELOC. Coincidence?