If you intend on managing the property yourself, be assured that you'll work for the cash flow you get because of that. ie.

Hey guys, I have a property under contract and before hand I spoke with a title company and they assured me they do assignments of contracts but now after looking at the contracts they are backing out saying that since the price I got it under contract to is different from the price I'm assigning it to they wont be able to close.

Rest assured, we will make this right. 

I realise it’s conceivable this may vary based on local law - but is anyone familiar with a prospective tenant being held liable for any amount based on an email assurance that lease terms would be acceptable/signed, then declining to sign a lease?  

If your property ever has a maintenance issue you can rest assured he will get it repaired at cost.Give him a call and interview him tell him angelou told you to call.

Put your family members in front of a realtor who can assure them those comps are realistic and get a bid from a handyman or two. 

Whenever a loan officer states, "it's not a problem", rest assured it IS a problem.

Let me preface this by noting that any of the individuals I would approach would be people I know quite well as I've established business relationships with them over many years at my current place of employment (since they know where I work, they can be assured I'm not going to run away with their money).

I'm inexperienced compared to you but on my most recent purchase of a SFH, I put down about 6% with owner financing making up about 18% which gave my lender assurance I was personally invested, that there was a lot of room for them to recoup their money and helped me to have a lower DP.  

Originally posted by @James Denon:I would like to offer him this: I will get a loan from a bank for 75% and for him to carry a note for 25%.So, I would be getting the property for zero downpayment.If I were the seller, I wouldn't be willing to spend time negotiating or talking about this until I had some written assurances from your lender that they are down for this.