I'm under contract for a nice double and was hoping to use part of the money for my portion of the down payment.

if you need $200K for a project, no one is going to loan you $200K - you need a down payment, holding costs, and you need to know what you're doing or you'll just turn that $200K into $150K.good luck

The current owner is letting me take over the property as a tenant as long as I pay the water bill and the mortgage payment on it and whenever I decide I can purchase property for the balance of the mortgage  they are in no hurry for me to purchase the home as long as the mortgage is paid. 

. - This will allow low down payment and the 203(k) allows repairs to be financed into the purchase mortgage.- The 203(k) will allow you to bid on properties that need repairs that won't qualify for a traditional mortgage => less competition => better purchase price.You will need to find a great local contractor you can trust to supply the required bids to qualify for the 203(k).- After closing, you can do some of the work yourself to save money, but the program doesn't allow you to pay yourself.You will want to buy a Class B property, maybe Class C+, in an area that seems to be improving.

It looks like according to the county site (sbcounty.gov) they require all renter payment go to the active owner. 

Box solely for the purpose of collecting rent but I do suggest having one and if nothing else works use it for rent collections but I would Electronic payments or bank deposits before doing mail.

- what about storage space?

The down payment wouldn't be minimal if your finances were tight.

No problem with down payment but will need conventional load which is not a problem as I have been pre approved many times just did not find right property.

What was nominally a 52k down payment turned into close to 100k--12k in closing costs, 12k in extra payments, and about 25k in labor to help me get it ready when I realized I couldn't get it all done by myself working evenings in a reasonable amount of time (plus I knew I couldn't do the egress windows myself).