Do you advise having my real estate agent verbally make these to the seller and then we put whichever in writing they prefer?  

I found a fourplex in my area, looked up the owner, and finally got his cell phone number.

They are Section 8, and 100% of their rent is subsidized by the city so I'm at least getting paid, however both the husband and wife have had their cell phones disconnected and are not responding to messages.

Whichever case the best time to start is the present.

And you need to seriously re-evaluate your method of determining ARV or repair estimates - whichever one seemed off.

At that point you can choose whichever market youd like because there are people going into foreclosures everywhere.

(cell phone, health car, car etc...) 

Make sure you have their cell phone numbers as texting deals out is more effective then emailing them out.

I prefer to use whichever one is closest to the job site.

I live in LA,CA and feel $20k is not enough for most REI stategies but I'm not sure, which is the reason for this post.I would love to get the most return that $20k would allow.I am open to all suggestions and will do my research on which ever method I choose before jumping into it.Thanks in advance.