This year, the real estate industry is expressing growing confidence in the potential investment returns in these markets.

For a Holiday Inn Express in downtown Dallas is a different story.

I appreciate the time you took in expressing your experiences and opinions.

After meeting with him and expressing his desire for privacy/discretion in sharing information he strikes me as the "millionaire next door" type - lives in a modest neighborhood, drives a modest car, does not want to be flashy, show off his wealth etc.We've had the chance to meet for 2.5 hours so far.He's in his 60's best I could tell - ready to retire.  

So what they do is when someone expresses interest in the property and asks for those financials, they force you to go check out the property while they run off somewhere and try to dig up some numbers that might make sense.I cannot speak for other multiple listing services, but what we have here in North Western Washington, the NMLS, lets agents provide erroneous and unsupported financial information.

He doesn't want to sell while he is alive because he wants to avoid capital gains, but he has expressed a flexibility to have his estate sell the property to me.  

EDIT: Of course no real estate agent will express it as bluntly as I just did!

You should be aiming for close to it, but consider that you do not want to scare this person off I would offer them a 1yr contract unless they express that they would like a longer one and maybe only a $50 increase or none at all if you are in line with the market and just not at the "top".

Not giving legal or financial advice, only expressing my personal opinion.

A very similar view was expressed by Andrew Campbell of Wildhorn Capital on the Investing In The U.S. podcast with Reed Goossens.