Be sure to check out the Ultimate Beginners Guide and the Podcasts.  

My personal credit is nearing 800, and our businesses have established relationships with several banks' commercial departments where all of the financial responsibilities have been met over time on our part, but I didn't know if ultimately, an entity could have an independent credit rating.I have an account at a local lumber yard that reports to Dunn and Bradstreet, but upon further research, Dunn and Bradstreet didn't appear to hold much weight from the brief digging that I did.  

Check out the Ultimate Beginners Guide if you haven't already.

Ultimately I'd like to find a G.C that can handle my projects, from demo to final finish.I'm looking to build a long term relationship with a company that possesses the following: Fair pricing, timely & efficient, communicative, can get the job done on time & on budget.

BP is the ultimate learning center for real estate investment.

Crystal,You could use the BRRR strategy, which involves using a hard money lender to buy the property and then rehabbing and renting out the property and ultimately refinancing with a traditional loan.

WelcomeJovana Rotula, Investing is fantastic, if you get a chance read the Ultimate Beginner's Guide here, under Education Tab under Guides, There are lots of strategies for Real Estate, but not every market fits every strategy

@Patrick Liska the furniture is part of the property and therefore covered under damages in the lease and because they are student rentals, parents are co-signing on our rentals so ultimately a responsible adult is held accountable. 

It's not fun and can cause a little extra work, but ultimately the LLC is the way to go.We now have 5 LLCs to hold different sections of the portfolio each has its own bank accounts, income statement balance sheet.

My preference is buy & hold opportunities, but ultimately I'm open to all ideas.