Is there any precedent for realtors or other placement services charging a flat fee instead or half month rent?

LOL   Well more accurately a 1/3 to half time job anyway.   

If he changes his mind about selling / buying me out i am stuck owning half a house. 

The demand is still very strong.SummaryThe investment market in Las Vegas grew strongly in the first half of 2024 and is expected to continue growing, though potentially slower in the second half of the year (as long as the interest rate does not change significantly).

For farm rural property loans, will be harder to come by if you want to get money out of your property, a good rule is to plan on keeping a land property for at least 10 years.If you goal is more cash flow related, you might want to look at buying single family, duplex, triplex or quadplex properties, these are the easiest properties to finance, and there are hundreds if not thousands of lenders in this space. 

But legal description contained phrase "one half of lot [x]..." which is a dead give away that this is not a legal lot under the Subdivision Map Act.  

There is also a prepayment structure that is equal to six months of interest (so half the rate) for about five years - this is more common for west coast DSCR lenders (sometimes called "Cali Style"Generally OK to negotiate - but with no prepayment penalty, you are likely going to have a significantly higher rate or points at close

As far as more technical financial analysis you mentioned above, I have found it is easiest to track these items in excel - I just update the workbook each time I analyze.

At favorable LTV's (75% and below) rates can be very competitive (currently in the 7%'s) or sometimes nearly half the rate of interest on alternative second lien positions loans.

Even if I was the senior lender for one of the new developments, in a downside scenario I wouldn't know what to do with the land / the half-finished or finished (but unsale-able for whatever reason) inventory.Therefore - I don't want to invest / make a loan in the development JV itself - I would rather make a loan at the parent-co level where there is collateral in the form of completed properties that are generating rental cash flow - they do have mortgages on them.