It would take around 5 years to pay off the HELOC by using some of the monthly rental income from two investment properties.

So - somewhere 2 hours away, or somewhere you like to vacation in, or where all your family lives, or where you plan to move someday.Too many people are trying to do exactly what you're doing - pick a market based on a formula - and they end up buying a random 'cheap' property thousands of miles away, turn it over to people they've never met or even spoken to, and then... lose money.  

But I purchased land in cash and leveraged it to build a new construction stick built home.

There is already at least one request with a lot of votes for this feature, and you can allocate your "votes" to it as well...maybe Buildium will start work on it after it gets a few hundred more votes. 

They said they'd do it through a title company if I didn't trust them, but they really needed the 2% fee to get everything rolling for the loan.

I have only been doing this for 5 years but what I have learnt is that it takes money to make money.  

I tell them that in my marketing, it's in the header of my application, and we do not make exceptions.

That's like asking how much it costs to buy a car. 

I think you just have to work it in as the cost of doing business. 

By hosting open houses?