If I am self managing my portfolio, what do I need to check/confirm, and what easily available tools are at my disposal (online, other) to help me do this? 

I have only heard of it happening one time personally..

This is a common misconception but we're an online platform where the owner chooses their own price and selects their own tenants.

The benefits of Kissimmee for a newbie is analyzing property potential is very easy - you will have a ton of carbon-copy comps to look at and the online estimators like Airdna can actually be pretty accurate. 

If it's a consultation with him personally - it should be very valuable.

If the IP addresses are the same for each signee, then there is a chance that the same person signed. 

I'm looking to do a cash out refi on a duplex I have, but I cannot find any reviews online or much of an online presence for them.

Although I had heard about them allover online, I was not sure how to find one.

Quote from @Michael Smythe: @Tuan Tran don't fall for all the hype about S8 by so called online "gurus"!

@Jorge Vazquez we stopped doing signs over 10 years ago.We had a separate phone number on our signs, so were able to track traffic & applications from them.We were getting more & BETTER leads from our online ads then the signs - so an easy choice to stop using them (also time & money savings).