You need(ed) to start from the end...your ultimate financial goals, and reverse engineer from there.You also need to understand that every entrance into a deal, sets up the exit...which is based on the entrance to the next deal, and so on...   

Long hours, hard work and ultimately very few actually make a profit at it.

It was a nominal amount of 729$...but for the sake of being fair I'm trying to gauge what the collective response would be.I agreed on listing the property for no fee (on the listing side) after repairs but ultimately my partners feel that the money from the buyers commission should be treated as profit to the LLC.  

Ultimately we decided to continue pursuing this deal as the overall numbers are still excellent.

He knows the apartments are survivable at best and they know he's the only person that will rent to them.Each unit will need to be renovated - some structural but all are to modernize.Local landlord tells me no matter what a person does this place will always be a $450 per month per unit rental. 

Ultimately we would like to accumulate rental properties but also own a home of our own. 

I understand your concerns and I see your point but if a man is making say ,double payments at that low interest rate, he is not doing himself a favor by putting his money to good use when that extra mortgage cost can be used toward the purchase of more properties which will Ultimately bring in more cash flow and will allow you to snowball quicker which, at your age is something you would need to do .

Her father tried to be an entrepreneur and had some cool inventions but ultimately was never successful in business and the family suffered quite a bit for it.

Long term goal is single family buy & hold, and ultimately small multi-family buy & hold all in the NW suburbs (Woodstock, Crystal Lake, Algonquin, Huntley, etc), and to replace my FT income in the next 2 years.

Ultimately they will likely pursue the water company who was extremely negligent.