I have been curious about this as well,  especially since I am a woman....wondered if it would make a difference...I have a friend who has had a few rentals in the past and he felt that his big and tall frame and his look made a intimidating factor...he also was quite handy on beign able to fix things...where as I am everything the opposite...so I have also exercised the idea of pretending to be some sort of manager....I like this question.

The reason I’m saying this is that maybe 5 years ago I went through a weird exercise of “How much cheaper would it be to live in...” with a couple of cities.

If you could get a 75/25 mortgage (just for a theoretical exercise) you have $30K debt per property.

You should live by the letter of your lease and local landlord laws, but there is some room to remember that your tenants are your customers. how much of that room you wish to exercise is your decision though.

There's an option to buy, so on the owners death, he can then exercise his option to buy, the heirs at that point can sell it to him capital tax free.4.

You should go through the exercise of building your own and understanding every number and how the formulas work. 

I decided to exercise that right and emailed the seller stating that neither myself, nor my investors were comfortable moving forward with the deal given that Pizza Hut could not confirm their willingness to renew the lease.7.

Your escrow will be returned to you (assuming no unusual factors) if your financing falls through or if you exercise your right to cancel the contract "for any reason" based on your home inspection. 

@Elijah FastYour lender and possible your insurer will require a Phase 1 assessment .... this is predominately a visual inspection and paper exercise (costing anywhere from $750 - $2500) with the objective of discovering any potential contamination of the property (or demonstrating that there is none).An abandoned underground storage tank (UST) is something which should be disclosed by the vendor (it appears that it has been in this instance), but it is an example of the sorts of things a Phase 1 ESA looks to discover.Depending on the results of the Phase 1, you may very well be requested to continue with a Phase II ESA.Having a Phase 1 lets you know what you are walking into ... which is why lenders want them.  

Should pay you up front and at time of exercise if done properly.Both of these strategies are extremely uncommon in most markets these days so you should have plenty of time to research LOAs while you hunt for one.