i would borrow the money from your relatives and pay off the home and not wreck your credit.your young you can gain 30k back over a short amount of time.Ripping rents and going into foreclosure although plausible wil trash your credit and probably cause you undo stress I see folks have done this over the years.. they blame the bank for their problems. good luck with it.. if it makes you feel any better I bought an office building at the top of the market and sold it on contract it cost me 1,200 a month for basically the rest of my life.. but its my core bank.. who lends me millions so no way I can default on it.. plus the PG would kill me.. the bank helps me make millions so 10k a year is a pittance.. get some funds save your credit and character and pay it all off and move on this is not a lot of money in the grand scope of your life.

Are any of your relatives investors that would let you partner on as part of a purchase?  

So first of all, you definitely got to get the spinning of the plate with your influence, your circle of influence which will be starting from your relatives, your family, and then you say some of them might be more open to others in investing with me; as you get more and more knowledge you want to put together some Power Point presentation.

If they had outstanding loans that never get paid, etc.Really, because you have the inside advantage, you can know everything about your friend or relative to make a very informed decision than to just accept a partner who is a stranger.Of course your relatives will think you are nosey, but hey, you have to protect yourself BEFORE you agree to get into a deal.Put it this way, if the Bank can go through all of this stuff and they will, then time for you to do it BEFORE the bank does it to make sure that you won't have problems.

DIY has too much time risk with your (relative) meager financial means.It really depends on the product you are building but your numbers are on the very low end of what I am seeing for new construction.

While that is nice, 100 bucks isn't going to change your lifestyle.Worst case scenario is your relative newness to the game causes you to overpay, or underestimate repair costs, select a poor quality tenant simply because they applied first and you are eager to get someone into the property to start paying you. 

It is not your relatives car.

On the other hand, if it's your relatives investing with you, then there shouldn't be major problems. 

When your relatives passes or permanently vacates the home, her heirs have two choices:  (1) buy the house for 95% of the then-current fair market value, or (2) sell the house. 

If you were to have this asset pre-marriage, then get married and build equity together, then divorce, it would be much easier to figure out your relative shares (pre-marital= all yours; marital share=50/50 split in most states and that 50% would be added to your pre-marital share).