For example, I mention that every adult must pay a $30 application fee, pass my credit/criminal background, make a combined income of 3x the rent, and whether or not the property accepts pets.

At the same time though, if you are the one who walked into the store and tried on the clothes and asked the sales clerk how it looks, then your asking to be influenced. if you spend time on a real estate investing website where people are in the business of investing in real estate and you ask if you should invest, you will likely get a lot of responses that say you should invest in real estate and let me help you for a fee.

.)- All in Cost = Cost to build * Square foot  - Sales Price = All in Cost + (All in cost * 20%)* Covers contractor and soft cost on either fee based or cost+- Profit = (Sales price - (Sales Price * 7%))* - All in Cost   accounts for agent fees and closing cost- Initial List Price = Sales price + 10%      A buffer to test market absorption- Break Even being All in cost, point where everyone is paid except me. - List price is to test the market absorption at "x" price. 250k land + build.

Is saving the fee a PM charges worth the potential thousands in cost and headaches?

If anything explain that there is a fee on top of a lifetime charge (which on its own is kind of weird), but okay. 

Having management in place always costed me 12% even with a '7.75%' fee. 

Normally, as @Jaycee Greene suggests, you make a management fee plus a split of cashflow with investors (oversimplified explanation).

And I don’t know if they’ve ever given up a power they took or a fee they’ve imposed. 

Also there is a management fee to pay for all of the above.

Understand the fees involved and calculate the total cost for an entire year of management so you can compare the different managers.