Beyond that, you need to become an expert on labor and material rates in your area or get connected with someone else that is. 

For you to ask this, you're valuing that "16% CoC" so highly it's likely overriding the real material aspect of the investment.

We have found that setting our expectations about what we want is helpful (financial performance, level of renovation we can handle, forced equity opportunities, number of bedrooms, etc) and then waiting for a deal to materialize. 

When you have unscheduled entry as an option, I think it encourages them to do weird stuff like hide stuff in weird spots, etc because they are always on guard.Hoarders clauses would have to be linked to fire codes I think for excess people and materials near fire sources, etc.

But if the blue sky materialized then repurchasing that equity could still turn into a win/win.

See what's on facebook marketplace & craigslist, so many people have extra construction materials from remodels they'll give away for like $20.

Slowly build out a repeatable process...if you continue to change things (as in different types of properties, different levels of renovation, different finish material, different neighborhoods, etc.) you create more variables and make it harder to solve to the problem.I am a math guy and less unknowns/variables you have the easier the problem will be to solve. 

But we also know that the materials he employed on the Usonian houses are not exactly affordable by today's standards... 

That said, I have a nice stream of passive income (including math freelance jobs to keep me busy), and a lot of time on my hands, as well as experience with materials and vendors doing home renovations.

Issues we faced were conflicting opinions on the next home we should purchase for our portfolio and what upgrades to do when we were doing a flip, the cost of labor and materials, etc.