Personally, I self manage but have built systems to allow it to be fully remote and very passive.

Questions they will have is who is the owner, what experience do they have, is their key person insurance against them etc. 

I got a deal on labor as I know the contractor personally and helped out a bit with the project.

It was a personal referral, received a credit at closing for renovations as well How did you finance this deal?

We will shop for used appliances where we can when we need one… or pick up used cabinets if we can, or search eBay for something smaller,  but going to the extreme of personally shipping something big in internationally for one-off renovation needs seems like a stretch of reasonable.Just like you mention, the number of unknowns would not seem to be worth it to me.Just my 2 cents.Randy  

While this job could be performed remotely, working with my peers in person for at least a year is important to me.

You'll want to put together a personal financial statement (basically lists of all your assets and liabilities) and have your tax returns ready.

So it's just personal preference and budget for a host.

I kind of didn't want to mention that on the listing so that it wouldn't turn people away before they even had a chance to see it in person.  

Pre-foreclosure - homeowners are desperate to avoid foreclosure and they quitclaim deed the title to some XYZ organization , person, or to a lawyer that specializes in foreclosure defense.