No, it's not a normal business practice and does not pass the smell test.From driving? 

Once you mention that their voucher may be taken away in an eviction, they normally get their act together.That’s a nice formality you have there!

Normally the escrow agent will want mutual sign off even if its clear the contract terms indicate one party should be awarded the escrow funds.

Go search the topic "Lifestyle Asset University" here on Bigger Pockets and you will see a longer thread with a lot of opinions (most are not members) but still worth a read as there are a half a dozen paid members from our group who have commented on that thread.We were formerly called Lifestyle Asset University, but I didn't realize that you couldn't use the word University in your company name here in Utah so we changed our name to Vodyssey. 

With current interest rates, and they are at least 1% higher with potentially additional points for non owner occupied property, it is hard to find properties that will allow for positive cash flow after paying the mortgage, if you are looking for money for the down payment from a private lender, those are normally at higher than market and I am not sure it would be possible to pay it off.... please remember you need to take into account that you may not have a tenant for a certain amount of time, a tenant may stop paying rent, or you will have a big ticket item to fix, so I would wait if I were you and save to have enough for the down payment and closing costs and perhaps some money set aside for repairs. you also want to make sure that you have your own emergency fund outside of the money needed for the investment property because life happens ....

The next several years are expected to be in a normal range of appreciation between 3.5 to 5%.

Don't be fooled by the seemingly higher bars in Whitman, the normal line in Grays Ferry is actually closer to or above 250k for the same metrics while Whitman does not break that threshold:Keep in mind, Grays Ferry is significantly larger than Whitman. 

Its normally fee service providers who are the greatest advocates of the program, whether it be agents, PM's, coaches/gurus. 

What several of these landlords have now done is instead of having a pet deposit, which you cant do with service animals, is that they just incorporate it into the normal deposit.

LTV is normally expressed as a percentage and that percentage is of the ARV.