However, after this last incident I would rather eat the vacancy costs than continue to deal with him.

Yep - when idiots say they love REI I just laugh - it's a means to an end, but you have to eat a lot of crap to make it.

I just spent Christmas in NW D.C. with a great family, wonderful friends, delish eats & plenty of good entertainment.

It would eat into my finders fee too much if I purchased it.

It's a short sale, unless you want to take it sub2, fix it up, and eat the negative cash flow for 15 years or so til it gets to zero equity.

Wouldn't that eat most of my profit up.

If you are covering the rehab out of pocket prior to financing perhaps supplying material yourself rather than eating the contractor markup on it might be worth looking into.

For me I don't buy condos as rentals here in FL because the fees just eat you up ($300/month is low where I'm at).

Back in the BC years, before computers and clouds, work was 24/7, eat, sleep, walk and talk RE and at any time almost you can set RE aside to manage anything that pops up, it's what's great about RE, you live a life while the wheels are always turning on the business side.

It'd be better to eat the cost of them hanging on then take the $400 per month "just until they find a new place" if by taking the money you get locked in.I've never heard of a lease "surviving" the sale.