I personaly do not subscribe to putting unqualified tenants into a home taking their option fee fully expecting them to fail and never buy!!   

It is better to lock interest at historically low rate (4.7%) using government to back the lender than find your "private" bank failed his obligation leaving you with nothing.

We have tenant in a sf in the best neighborhood of the  city on a dead end street.Sec 8 failed huge deck because of peeling paint. 

Cleveland may be in the rust belt, and there may be a steady population decline attributed to that fact, but there are a bunch of stable industries in the area that makes it unlikely that Cleveland will have a rapid decline like Detroit.Anyways, let's see some major industries in Cleveland fail before we start calling it out as a potential Detroit.

I have tried to fight this battle on the West coast and you can for sure landlock a property if  the person owned both properties and failed to give a together with easement when they sold one .the easement by necessity sounds like the play here and then its up to a trier of fact and maybe the other party wont want to spend legal fee's defending. ???

Actually, you should have served them notice the minute the septic failed but that ship has sailed. 

Repaired failing floor joists, complete kitchen remodel...paint etc.

Of the business I get from bigger pockets, a significant amount is from people that just got burned and lost their $20,000 earnest money deposit after failing to close on a house.

@ToRena Webb-Thomas I agree with @Karen Rittenhouse that you are failing as a Landlord.When you made an offer to purchase the property, you should have received a copy of the lease for review so you know exactly what you were buying.

Depending on the state you are in a HELOC is a full recourse loan which means that if you fail and lose your home, they can go after you for any losses.