For example, seller may have 4.5% debt and so current NOI is worth more to seller than a new buyer who has to pay 6.5% debt.Seller finance is a great tool too.My only caution is to NOT overpay for a property in exchange for seller finance at an attractive rate.Here is a hypothetical say market cap is 7.0%.New conventional debt is 6.5%.But seller will carry at 5%.With seller finance at 5%: What price does one pay?

Now we have all sorts of fake lenders trolling SM sites promising the moon telling folks what they want to hear and scamming them out of small and Big dollars some of these folks lose 10s of thousands to these folks.. with the  line  " Hey its going to fund next week just need another 5k for some BS item"

The owners may agree to carry part of the financing, but you won't need them to stick around to transition operations.After acquiring the properties and assets you wish, you would either run your own business, or part-out and resell some of the assets.From your post, it does not sound like parting out the properties is a viable path and where you admit to having no experience with vacation rentals or the resort business, you might want to explore purchasing the business with the current owners hanging around for a bit to help you get your feet wet.Regardless of approach, it needs to have legs to be worth pursuing.

Things like not using rental income, limiting the number of properties, not offering cash out loans, loan minimums and seasoning are all different items you will face when interviewing conventional lenders.

Syndications are simply a business structure where a group of people combine to carry out a business or project.

So your best bet is to find another lender if you find specific items that you do not agree with 

A lot of investors just gets their contractors in there and get itemized bids especially if the contractor has good eyes.

Some leases say these items are "payable before rent".

One tool I've utilized extensively for personal and client acquisitions are seller carried transactions. 

I would not hesitate to invest in Athens if the numbers look good;  new builds in Athens, to me, carry less risk for price correction than Hazel Green as well.