In the lower end neighborhoods, there are lots of homes with deferred maintenance, and any one home does not stand out.

Fewer threads to scan and it makes them stand out more.all cash

Currently I maintain an Excel spreadsheet with 3 worksheets, 2 for my rental properties and 1 for general LLC expenses not attributable to any particular property.

From the wording of your question, I get the sense that you either got or are expecting a credit on the HUD-1 for the property taxes attributed to the seller's period of ownership.

A simple accounting system will have property accounts, income and expenses and a general ledger for espenses that are not attributed to a particular property, as well as other income like interest income and accounts for your escrows.

The improved value on the date of purchase is not a % of the purchase amount, it's the actual dollar amount at purchase that is attributed to improved(non land) value.Also remember tax value only deals with what local municipalities say your property is worth, the IRS isn't really concerned with that.

I am going to go visit the property tomorrow at a group showing and was wondering if there was any way to engineer my offer to stand out amongst the others.

If you provide the data to the appraiser showing that the property in question has attributes comparable to let's say properties in $120K rage, versus $100K range, the appraiser will take this data in consideration. 

If you're interested in renting to college kids springfield is a fine option there weren't nearly as many destructive parties down there as I see in warrensburg on the weekends I attribute it to the agriculture focus of the school farm kids tend to work on the weekends.

You'll slowly gain a reputation and stand out above the rest over time.