I put all of the rent towards paying off CC's and it has now paid off the CC's and paid for itself several times over (and the house is now worth $320k). 

Given the C/C return and rent roll this appears to be a C class property?

If for some reason you don't quite have enough for the down and CC, you might consider going thru a private lender first, then Refi after you own it and fix whatever needs to be done.

@Jason Ma welcome to dealing with OOS contractors...As far as using your CC to buy stuff, I'm not a big fan of that anymore.

I pointed out a cc-op board rejected president Nixon when he tried for a coop in NYC when he left the White House.

I purchased for $216,000 and had financed the repairs on an introductory no interest CC over the next year to rehab the property.

You can charge a furnace and still be under 10% utilization.Pay off the balance immediately after the CC generates the statement (that's when they report it).

He was trying so hard to convince me to apply for a new cc.

CC, taxes and holding cost are figured in.

@Shane Ward do you mind sharing for educational purposes what your credit utilization was in doing all the rehab (ie did you max out all your cc and max out your Heloc)?