If you discovered the issue before paying for the appraisal that could hopefully save some costs (in case the appraiser is with the wrong AMC).Pre-vetting with the lender on rental history/AIRbnb/1007 as well as seasoning could help. 

I am happy to pay a competent firm to keep me from violating the terms of my plan and answer questions, but somehow I fear that no one will want my account because the banking part is outsourced to Titan Bank (which is not paying interest, so I should probably switch from them too) and perhaps there are no custodial fees to be had the way this plan was set up. 

So really need to do some deep market research, haha, but not so willing to pay for this, at least not at this stage when I'm just starting out.

(seems straight forward)B) Landlord denies the request for ESA exemption of pet fee / pet rent, but offers the applicant the unit if they ARE willing to pay fee / rent for the animal as a pet.Or... 

No fees, no pre-pay.

@Scott Goulet if that's the case and there is no significant difference in occupancy, then my gut tells me that it is not a major factor that guests consider and are willing to pay a premium for.

That is not uncommon, BUT asking the seller to do that likely means paying a bit more for the property.

What are your plans to verify their work before paying them?

It's better to pay more, knowing you have something secured versus cheaping out and not even closing. 

I see a lot of people buying class D rentals seeing it appears to cashflow then have one tenant stop paying and destroy the place to bankrupt themI do not want that to happen to you, so this is why I gave the options I did.