Since they are considering renting their properties out, sell them on the concept of getting consistent cashflow from you - without the hassles of being a landlord.You will then need to make sure you can make those monthly payments EVERY month in addition to do remodels.

Then it shifted to more flips and rentals, with a lot of discussions on how to capitalize since the credit markets were frozen.

I will be speaking to a local one tomorrow morning and then go from there. 

I've lost count of the number of RAD investors who posted in the BiggerPockets forums about their "hard money loans" and then having their distributions "frozen".

Then just use a normal couch.

These will give you the out numbers, and then you can work backwards once you know the repair costs.

Then scale to multifamily eventually if you want. 

Then I'd push those factors out if there were no good comps.  2 miles, 6 months.  2 miles 12 months , etc.It takes some local knowledge to know when you're pushing those parameters out too far to be useful. 

.), and you’ll have to do some continuing education for licensing compliance, then you might have some technology costs and some other costs I’m forgetting, of course vehicle maintenance and insurance and those types of things.

If you are and that quote is at full RC then you have the best rate there is.