There are exceptions if the tenants damage the furniture, even thought it is your furniture.

A lot of people can swing the 6% on a permanent basis, but not in years 1 and 2 when they have to buy all the "accessories" that come with a new home, like the new furniture, the redone kitchen, landscaping the yard, bla bla bla.By frontloading the monthly savings into year 1, poof, we've created a furniture budget. 

VA loan with $15,000 added renovations and furniture.

I spent about 6k to get rid of the smoke smell including painting, cleaning the vents, cleaning the furniture etc.  

You can find videos/articles online on how to get the basement dry, but the basic process is: 1) turn off all electric to the basement (to avoid electrocution from the water), 2) run pumps to get the standing water out of the basement (sounds like you're already doing this)3) remove all furniture and items from the basement,4) once you've pumped out the standing water from the basement, rent a wet/dry carpet cleaner/extractor from home depot, and use it to extract as much water as possible from the carpets (they'll be much lighter and easier to move once you get the water out). 5) After you've used the carpet extractor to get most of the water out of the carpet, remove all carpet and get it out of the house for drying (if you're trying to salvage the carpets), or throw the carpet out.

I also took their abandoned newer furniture to my rental so that I could charge $400 more a month for my furnished house.

Kids were picky and many only wanted to keep some of the furniture.

This is the same material found in the cheap furniture you have to assemble your self from Ikea and Walmart.It is the cheapest possible material available, and thats why they use it.

I'd offer different packages, such as purchasing furniture and supplies, doing actual set-up, refreshing an already-furnished rental, doing marketing, etc.

I had no verifiable work history, some second-hand furniture, thrift store clothes, a salvaged minivan, and -$2000.