Why did the previous owner sell it for only $85,000?

I'm keen to connect with fellow STR owners in the area to gather insights on the ease of finding cleaning services and associated running costs.

Go to Etsy and search for "rental property tracker," and you will find hundreds of nice spreadsheets to track 10-20 rentals, usually for under $10.Software has extremely helpful features like online payments, marketing syndication (click a button, and your property is advertised on multiple sites), electronic document review/signing, maintenance tracking, and owner reports.

She has a duplex, one unit was owner occupied until her stroke; other had been rented until the same timeframe.

So yes, correct, the borrower is the USER not the owner, the bank/lender is the "owner" right.

The owner is willing to take a cash offer for asking, or a little under.

There's no benefit to the owner. 

I have seen this work in high priced markets like San Jose Ca.. where the property owner is a very wealthy business person with no time for rentals and the person they sublet to is close t them either friend or bizz associate and will work the property to make  the delta as the owner just does not want to mess with day to day and there is extreme trust.The other thing I have done personally is with the insurance companies ..

Consider spending some time in these areas to get a feel for the market and see if you'd enjoy living there. you ever dealt with ground up non owner occupied construction loans? 

Sure enough the new owner was not renting their newly acquired property.Since rents have sharply escalated over the last few years, a rental with too low rent is a red flag of possible fraud.I sold a property in 2014, for $30,000 over 10 years ago.