They usually want you to have skin in the game, so probably 20% down again, but at least with flipping you'll get the money back, plus your profits, within 3-4 months (If everything works out of course). 

have done lots of laminate but never vinyl tileHow difficult is it to get up if you need to replace?

If you run into difficulty because you don't have experience taking care of property, you could always try an FHA loan.  

There are a lot of difficulties that come with D class, but nothing is unmanageable!  

What difficulties could a newbie encounter while trying to invest in a distant market?

If you're putting up 100% of the capital and they have no skin in the game that's a red flag to me.

I want to know that you would be a good tenant, and want to know up front where the potential difficulties exist.

The difficulty that Travis County creates for you is that it lists every document filed in every case.

I would then take the refi funds and then pay off the hard money loan and recoup the personal investment.How difficult is the refinance process?

Most of the time you end up stroking big checks and wait and lose control and have to go back and fix it anyway.No way I'd wait on somebody (who has no skin in this and doesn't really give a rip) to do this for me while taking forever and getting a month of rent for the privilege.