This seems crazy as the risk is different, the rules of what you can do with the cabin is different, and most importantly the price difference between cabins on land they own versus forest leased land is extreme.

I've seen many of these courses and they all seem to be very generic.

Based on those numbers, yes CoC return is "accurate" but I wouldn't say it's "reasonable"...in fact, it seems VERY high.

The ones in the Facebook groups seem to be scammers. 

It seems like you're asking the right questions and talking to the right professionals.

This seemed like a good deal to me, since the seller is paying for this and it would also give me time to hopefully refinance into a good rate before hitting the 6.875% mark again.

I had assumed it would be beneficial; just seems more expensive.

But 40k in revenue for a 515k house doesn't seem like the best area for str.

But maybe they were delivered to the wrong address and the lady in wrangler simply had behavior that seemed to match a porch pirate.  

And always have the ability to fire a builder and pay out for work (which is why you don't want them to front load the contract) in case they simply aren't producing.New construction seems risky.