Anyone else who ask you pre-pay is likely fooling you.Another advice is never hurry into any deal due to some artificial deadline - such as lease is up. 

I'm definitely partial to the out of state thing, I do it... you have to do it intelligently.

Are you going to send your super genius and intelligent bot out to yet another central repository secured database that contains and updates mortgage position?

I consider myself pretty intelligent in math and coding and wondering if going to college would be a good idea, anything helps, let me know.

Is there anyone that can speak intelligently about it and familiar with the area?

I get it that it sucks from a tenant's point of view when a disaster or other issue inflates the market price - but unless you're going to have artificial price floors, you cannot have artificial price ceilings.

Thus, I think you may have seen artificial demand in 2018, where people who otherwise would have waited until 2019 or 2020 to buy may have forced themselves to buy in 2018 (even borrowing the down-payment from their parents) before rates went any higher.

It currently has a artificial turf that faded and torn in places.Many thanks,-Eric

Also, unless you use an electronic lockbox on the front door, you may want to use intelligent locks, which require Internet access, which requires power.No question that there are many reasons why you should turn on utilities, not the least of which would be to better understand how the plumbing and electrical is working given the property has been vacant for a while, but I can't think of one reason why you shouldn't, including the one about saving money, because I am fairly confident that not having utilities will end up costing you alot more than you might think.Best of luck on your project!

Don't try to convince everyone you are an idiot before you even begin...they might believe you.Just be proud to say what you really are, which seems to be an intelligent guy who knows the area, has a lot of work experience in the field (and life experience) and is eager to learn more about REI and buy his first property.