The agent has been communicative the whole time (something that I can say about 5% of agents in my limited experience) so I'm a fan!

You can collect applications and then choose the "most qualified" applicant, but that's opening the door to Fair Housing complaints.

What kills me are the mailings I get from investors offering to buy my house for a "fair price."  

You can just look for houses you like and run the numbers rather than focusing on small areas.As far as AirBnB, our market is fairly saturated so you really have to operate at a high level to stand out and/or have a really excellent location. 

I’m looking to house hack my first property and walked through a couple of properties that have a fair amount of square footage but only 3 bedrooms.

I did look at some of the material participation criteria and we should easily surpass the requirements since we pretty much spent time improving the home ourselves, managed all guest communication, etc.Thoughts?

I am not an engineer, so please consult with an engineer or licensed GC in your area before proceeding, but this should be a fairly minor change that should be completed in under 1 day.

In all fairness though we are conservative and I personally go visit the market ( at my expense) and the individual we are going to work with before I start the program..

The biggest advice I would give on this is just be patient and be very communicative with your PM.

Since you’re buying at fair market value, there’s no room for margin.