Just wanted to know from a fellow New Yorker how you jump those hurdles.  

Account Closed that is kind of unreasonable to call the seller shady after they ask you to comply with the contract you signed.

What kind of hurdles could I be looking at with renovations and dealing with the neighbours? 

The book "Start" by Jon Acuff is a great resource to get over the hurdle begin your journey.

Just finished my one last week... it took longer then expected because the way my ownership is setup with my trust and llc... the bank apologized and ensured me it’ll go faster on the next one because they have the info now.... there will always be hurdles... just have to see it through.

That said, there are some lenders who can go up to 80% LTV but it's typically very hard to qualify for due to higher rate/payment making it difficult to hit the DSCR hurdle.

However it is not unreasonable to have her shoulder a larger share of other household expenses if you provide 100% of the housing but whatever you do tread carefully.

You don’t want to open the floodgates to unreasonable requests right out of the gate and saying yes to this might do that.

Unreasonable cost adjustments.

When I lived in Texas I was in an HOA neighborhood, I would never deal with an HOA again, they can completely unreasonable and hit you with fines for the smallest things.