They have more skin in the game then you do.Make sure you get clear title.

That being said, they'll usually be looking for you to have around 30% of "skin in the game". 

I pride myself on being a great landlord and all their petty complaints and accusation of being neglectful really got under my skin, and I was JUMPING whenever they said JUMP.

It often seems to be the norm here to provide some sort of rent concession or move in special to further attract tenants, especially for apartments, such as: half-off first month, free cable/internet, gift cards, etc.The one rule I have always stuck to is: you must get at least one month's rent for the deposit, any less and the tenant doesn't have enough skin in the game to prevent them from packing up and leaving in the middle of the night.

The 5.5% one time fee will not pay for all this activity.Maybe the sponsor is putting in huge amounts of skin in the game/cash, in which case they are deriving income from that to keep the fund financially self sufficient.

My plan is to buy with hard money with some skin In the game and use a separate construction loan for rehab [203(k)].

The reason lenders do that is there is a massive difference in default rates between those that have skin in the game and those that don't put anything into it. 

As stated above the cost of the course was $5,800 but they were also willing to work with me and spread that out somehow but wanted to make sure I had enough skin in the game.

Haven't landed that first deal because of no skin in the game and it's frustrating.

the uninitiated are still thinking HML is based solely on collateral when in fact that's not the case.. depending on the company but most want skin in the game.. and they want to check you out like a conventional lender..