Your host's (Abby's) half-naked profile pic is very off-putting.

My number 1 tip would be to go off market and find owner that wants to sell at a discount / prefers speed and convenience. 

We have run in to numerous accounts of this.

I’ll bring in licensed electricians and plumbers for their sign-offs.

Offer to pay them off in 5-10 years at a higher interest rate.

I am foreseeing a bit of a push back or even turned-off potentially decent tenants by the $50/pp screening fee, mostly for a family of 4 ($200 out of pocket).I was wondering if offering a credit of either 50% or the full 100% of the screening costs from the first or second month's rent is a good idea.Thought?

With current interest rates, and they are at least 1% higher with potentially additional points for non owner occupied property, it is hard to find properties that will allow for positive cash flow after paying the mortgage, if you are looking for money for the down payment from a private lender, those are normally at higher than market and I am not sure it would be possible to pay it off.... please remember you need to take into account that you may not have a tenant for a certain amount of time, a tenant may stop paying rent, or you will have a big ticket item to fix, so I would wait if I were you and save to have enough for the down payment and closing costs and perhaps some money set aside for repairs. you also want to make sure that you have your own emergency fund outside of the money needed for the investment property because life happens ....

If you used a loan to rehab your property and find yourself in a difficult position, doing a straight refi (just paying off the old mortgage) will be easier than trying to pay off the original loan and take additional cash out.

They see foreigners as one-off buyers so they're not too much concerned about building a relationship or their reputation in the eyes of somebody who doesn't live there for that matter.

I'm not sure if they can realistically pass that liability off to you simply by stating it in their contract.