You do need to figure out which animal you prefer - residential or commercial, office or retail, etc.

I believe, in today's enviroment, the lender has to be convinced that the stand to lose more if they decide to wait until foreclosure.Bank owned properties are a different animal.

I don't expect that to happen in rural areas, but it doesn't take much in cities for people to act like animals.

Trustee Sales are a lender slightly different animal, however property taxes are basically always in first position and always going to be paid one way or the other. 

You can have (depending on what zoning allows), bed and breakfasts, equine facilities, up close and personal with animals, you pick em fields (tomatoes, strawberries, etc.), as mentioned CSAs, produce stands with all sorts of local grown and produced products (esp. as the "eat local" movement grows even larger), and so on and so on and so on.

I have done one where there was positive equity and it was a matter of simply negotiating with the owners on what they would take for their equity..but this one is a different animal...

They are very different animals...Lease/Purchase is very risky for the Tenant/Buyer because they are obligated to buy the home at the end of the term, however contracts can be written differently depending on the negotiation.

Maybe such an animal doesn't exist yet... opportunity for some lucky REI entrepreneur out there?

A friend looked at a house for me where part of the roof had caved in, animals had been running through it and there was black mold in most of the house.

Hello everyone my name is Will and I would like to say that I really like this forum and thank you for helping people who are just starting out or are thinking about starting like me.Well, not long ago I was in a dilemma between taking Animation or Real Estate, well that is no more for I have decided to go for REI, I am a full-time legal clerk I work for my parents managing their immigration business here in LA despite the love* I get from older employees/co-workers I manage and everything is under control.Now what I was wondering is how can you get started in REI since I work full-time and I can’t leave my job cause if I do there will be no one to watch out for the business, thing is I want to see how much you would need to start investing after learning the process that is, if say I had $5,000 or even $10,000 in hard cash which I know is not much, but is there any way and I mean any way one could start investing with that kind of money off the bat?