Is it just cosmetics like paint and carpet or something more substantial?

You'll find that many often require substantial fees in addition to your monthly payment in order to finance projects outside of their normal scope.

Is it true that you receive substantially more rent than the normal market?

Since this will be the house you live in take advantage of a regular mortgage and use the rest to buy an investment property. 

Both eventually declared BK and I was out the loan and attorney fees which were substantial.

There's a lot of guessing on the expense side, but I suppose the rather substantial condo fees at least mean I don't have to worry about big repairs like roof or anything.

She wrote back that he told her he received a "substantially" higher offer and that the very day he attempted to cancel his counter offer to me 9 hours early, he went into contract with another buyer.When I received the e-mail containing his written withdrawal of the counter I thought "oh well, that's that" and initially thought I had lost the right to accept his counter offer. 

But again I don't quite see why people would sell for substantially less if they could get more in the open market?

If you have a well-maintained unit in a decent area, your tenants will want to stay, even if the increase is substantial and it is within market rent.BTW, prior to purchasing, ask the owner for copies of the most recent utility bills, tenant estoppel certificates (signed paper from tenant stating financial terms of the lease) and CLUE report ( A report that lists if any insurance claims have been filed against the property in the last 7 years) to ensure property is insurable.

That is actually a route I am very interested in taking, which I why I stopped when I saw the Quad in the first place.