We can chat more directly if you like. ping me if you are free to talk shop and trade war stories and maybe we can find a project that we both can work on.Cheers

Along the way the GC and subcontracted plumber mentioned numerous times that they found great news or thought of more efficient solutions (i.e. the mainline plumbing under the basement was intact--that they had assumed was all broken and needed replacing).

They could be unsavory for numerous reasons (as an extreme they could be child molesters or drug dealers).  

So far I like section 8 but I have heard the war stories and I know some section8 offices in certain.

Yes too numerous to describe in a short reply - plus ethical issues

You can also throw in Palmer Park and Indian Village and a few others as well but you probably thinking the other areas that I didn't mention are war zones which they are..

Usually these are either properties in war zones or with some serious issues (rent control, structural damage, bad tenant profile). 

Then he discovered the judge from Housing court had previously put a demo order on the house due to a past owners negligence and not correcting numerous code violations, also recorded on title.

However, this strategy has been used successfully (without IRS challenge) by numerous property owners for nearly 20 years, including many public companies that have reported their transactions to the SEC, with the full acquiescence of their boards and outside auditors.

Is it relatively safe to be looking at most houses in those 4 places or is it a street-to-street or block-to-block situation where one street is great for investment and the next one is a war zone?