I recently had a tenant get his "plumber buddy" to snake out a drain.  

Tub was cracked due to not being supported. 2) No access panel required by code for the pump, the pump was in the rear of the tub buried under the tub deck. 3) No thermostatic anti-scaled mixing valve required by code for the roman tub filler 4) No dedicated circuit for the pump required by the manufacturer, the electrical for the tub was piggy backed on the vanity lights 5) no GFCI protection on the tub as required by code  6) no grounding of the tub motor as required by code 7) ABS drain glued to PVC drain pipe with ABS glue 8) the tub valve connections  uried with no access were IPS threaded stainless steel flexible water lines instead of hard sweated copper connections, (lost count on all the shark bites they used, they must buy them in bulk) 9) all the tile was tiled directly on the plywood of the tub deck, no underlayment to prevent the tile from being popped and the grout cracking from moisture getting to the plywood...the list goes on and on.. oh and the tub filler valve was located on the back side of the tub, not a code violation but certainly not user friendly for somebody to have to climb basically into the tub or over it to turn the water on, but that's minor in the scope of all the code violations and poor workmanship, that's just poor design. 

depends on your ARV...if you do the drain tile...after that you could probably finish that basement for $12-15K.  

A few things to remember for your lease:Specify a late fee (grace period is 10 days in CT), and note that payments will be applied to late fees first, before being applied to unpaid rent charges.Specify that toilets/drains clogged from anything other than deterioration or failure of the pipes will be billed to the tenant.

I'm happy to pay anything that wasn't documented enough that I could win in court (such as the light bulbs and the drain clog).

Told the guy , have blankets , fill the tub with water , have flashlights . if the electric goes out and it gets cold , open all the faucets to drain down the house .

I don't want to tell everybody of this venture I'm doing only to have it all go down the drain and make me look like a failure to my friends, family, and colleagues.

As long as you're charging a big security deposit they'll take care of it.The septic tanks are configured where each home has a 1000 gal septic has ( 2, 500 gal tanks) and each tank runs to a field where the water drains into.

I am more inclined on you pulling that permit instead of the owner, often times the owner is not interested or lazy, so all that hard work will go to the drain.

After you refi at $900k, it's going to be a huge drain on you each month with the mortgage payment.Two ideas:1) 1031 exchange the property you're currently living in and use the $500k as a down payment on a $2M apartment building.