Read some books.

I actually found out about this forum through Brandon Turner’s book, Investing in Real Estate with No (and Low) Money Down.

Assuming you can book your contractor for whenever you want I see no reason to rush into moving her out just to renovate.

You should read more books on this topic because you haven’t even scratched the surface.

We'll see PT stocking(at major shops) increase as we head into the holidays, I'm curious the amount of jobs versus previous years.Problem is the lying is so rampant, hell it's "main-stream" now for cooked-books and out-right lying in reports. 0 accountability anymore, 0. 

Local and regional banks also have a ton of those loans on the books so let's see what will happen.  

Any books you can recommend?

I'm reading up on books and articles on how to do this but sometimes it's easier to join social groups or talk to people close to me that have done it before.Right now my goal is to get pre-approved for a loan and to learn from others.

Catherine id highly recommend spending a full day or two consuming youtube videos that specifically go into detail about this process, theres so much to teach and writing this whole thing out would literally be a whole book.

There are plenty of books out there that give you advice and tips on what to do and how to draft leases but if you're still uncomfortable, then having an agent by your side for the first rental, might not be a bad idea.