More of the thing to consider is having reserves to cover the loans on all your rental properties, and a 3-6 month emergency fund to pay for your own home and life should your income get reduced a bunch.

Can anyone advise what specific charges I can dispute or reduce within the closing costs of a refinance?

I will work on a case by case basis from there to defer or temporarily reduce rent.

Perhaps working out a bit of extra time to pay rent is realistic due to circumstances though asking for a reduction in rent is nonsense as lenders won't be reducing mortgage payments nor will tradesmen be lowering their prices due to the Corona Virus. 

And at the risk of sounding boring and repetitive, would it also be fair to say that you're pretty jumpy about this virus thing right now too - which will kind of make any anxious situation double even triply worse ( that is TOTALLY a word)One thing I know about anxiety is that 'SHOULD-ING' people generally makes not only the situation worse( your PM wants to sack you) but it also tends to make you feel a LOT worse - it kind of grinds inside you until you explode at the cat/partner/milkman etc...And can I also just say that lots of people are anxious right now and we all deal with our anxiety differently so maybe those who are not Patricia , friends let's get out of the judging chair ..right?

I am thinking organizations that will help them pay rent, utilities, etc.One that I am aware of is Catholic Charities: https://ccdocle.org/program/emergency-assistance-servicesPlease add to this thread as you see fit; we can all benefit from this information being shared with our tenants to reduce the impact on our clients.If there is already a thread about this in another forum (current events, landlord forum, etc) that I didn't notice, please let me know/link it here.Thank you!

If our numbers trend at a flatter level, it will reduce panic and could stabilize this as we fight through it.

(Actually my wife is the clinical psychologist)...but my guess is that they are bored and riddled with anxiety at the same time, and “making their next move” is a nice fantasy for them.

I've used the rental calculator, read "How to Buy a Duplex" guide and many other posts but am having some serious, serious anxiety about this potential purchase.

Using a HELOC to invest in other property is a good idea if you know that you can handle the payments but remember your mom would be using her house as collateral like you said, HELOC's have a variable interest rate and you would essentially be reducing the equity in the house.