This house sits on 5 acres in a 'ranchette' subdivision.

Buyers don’t care if you shelled out more on the rehab, if you’re priced too high, you’ll end up sitting on the market way longer than you want, driving up holding costs.Lastly if your buying on market, REO or Corporate sellers are dominating and not as willing to negotiate as owners would.

Out-of-state investors love it out here because of the low barrier to entry, high rental demand (your house is not going to sit vacant), and lots of growth potential in areas that are going through revitalization, among other things.

From there most of the time the personal connection is there and they have no problem sitting down for a coffee chat. 

However, a wall sitting on top of conc. is not typically allowed however, there are work arounds.

Do you get interest on that money that is sitting there in your home? 

The slow and steady approach is fine for this property but it feels like a waste to sit on a low performing asset and assuming rent increase is a strong enough lever to pull on for FI.

Sitting on a college degree of software development, I concur. 

You don't want to cash-out refi and then be sitting on cash costing you 7% while you search for a deal.

I remeber in the early 80s you could not give property away in the seattle market :) That's right. and they would sit on the market forever.