Barbara- I need to take action and start the ball rolling now.

You'll hear people talk about the 50% rule, it's a rule of thumb, that suggests you should expect expenses to be in the ball park of 50% over the long term on residential properties, whether single family (SF) or multi-family (MF). 

Any money Curt has spent on the property to make it rent ready is accrued until Curt exercises his option at which time the make ready costs are added to his basis.  

Ben,First, I'm no expert, but we would need more information to help answer this question.Some things that I can see that we would need is.Purchase PriceNon-Refundable Option Consideration - This amount will go towards your down payment/purchase price if you exercise your option.  

. : )Low barrier to entry and everyone thinks brokers and agents should work for free on the investor side and shotgun offers all over creation with low ball offers.

This 'feel' is NOT an analytical number crunching exercise. 

Point being, the example is to show that no matter the amount, it should not be done that way.Regarding milestone releases you mentioned, that is a whole different ball game.

Immediately I could see that the margins were too slim to be worth it, but I went through the entire exercise as a matter of brain-training.

Our budget was in the same ball park as yours.

It could be very hard to justify a low ball offer.