I have seen pumpkin sales, Christmas tree sales, fruit stand, boiled peanuts, eyeglasses stand, carpet truck sales, landscaping storage,etc.If you put temporary things on the land to offset taxes then make sure it is not things that could environmentally contaminate the land such as a used car lot etc.

The average twenty something looking for an apartment in my area the main driver is dollars out of pocket not lower environmental impact.  

We set up all the inspections, asked for copies of bills, official rent roll, environmental questionaire.

., in addition to the down payment, make sure you raise money for the tax and insurance reserves, working capital, lender fee, mortgage broker fee, application fee, attorney fees, securities attorney, title work, survey, appraisal, physical inspection, environmental study, etc.As a rule of thumb, you can estimate the above around 3% of the purchase price.Also, as @Kit England mentioned, you will need to raise funds for cap ex.

I can tell you without seeing the property it could have pollution in the soil that could cost a fortune to abate.  

Survey, soils, environmental (if necessary), various city or county zoning fees & permit fees, address cards, utility disconnects/taps, insurance, storm water, architectural/civil/structural, etc.  

Usually when I've selecting commercial / light industrial sites, I or my buyers want the land because the location fits their intended purposes then we do the due diligence for encumbrances, environmental issues, etc.

I have an engineer that travels across the country for me and does a site inspection, environmental phase 1 study, and a cost reserve stable.So since the owner pays water, I'll have the expenses as 55% and deduct the cap ex upon inspection/inspection report since I can tell without going through inspection what the cap ex will be.

How can a town of 9,000 support a Chicago sized renovation project...Just speculating, but there are likely some insurmountable environmental issues with this property. 

The other houses in the dead end have been converted to offices( the house across the street is a nice looking law office and the house adjacent is a pretty decent looking environmental consulting company).