There's nothing stopping you from optioning the house in change for money that you spend to make vital repairs and at least keep code enforcement and others from pursuing.

If you use typical 12x12 peel and sticks, you're giving water ample opportunity to penetrate your top layer and get to your subfloor because of all of the seams..

These floors should last longer than most other things in the apartment given their wear layer. 

Likely, the contractor will have some issues with the asphalt layer, but honestly, I've seen Starbucks constructed on asphalt parking lots.  

The options are either getting a dedicated PC and maintaining it or loading an extra layer of software on your Mac to run PC software.

Keep in mind everything in the exclusive contract is negotiable so one approach might be to sign a 3 month agreement to test the waters and see how it goes, if you find your getting good service and work well with the agent you can always extend / resign. regardless of any exclusive agency agreement you are free to search for properties yourself, the advantage of using an exclusive agent is that if you find a property (driving, online etc.) you can send the address to your agent and they will layer on their advice / recommendations / thoughts on the property as it relates to the market.

I've most recently used the kind that looks like a single plank with beveled edges, when you have flex due to uneven floors it doesn't lift the edge of the wear layer.

These are vital in the case you ever have to retrieve the asset through judicial/non judicial sale.

No UT has plenty of growth, colleges are booming in attendance, economy is strong and the vitality is still high, imo.

Primarily access to the MLS is a vital tool.Good luck - Ned