How do they get tenants in place, and how difficult is it really?

If not you, it is likely the trustee of the estate.  

I use it for my personal portfolio as well.

Most lenders don't do HELOCs on rentals, but there are plenty that do.

This could lead to a huge tax bill and penalties.Think carefully before you do this.

@Ed Ventura Its one of the most difficult issues when you get into property types like this. 

Do you really believe the lender snuck in terms knowing you, the "real estate savvy" one was not present"?

It's a good time to start exploring your loan options and setting yourself up to search alerts so that you can become familiar with the area, and start running the numbers :) it's a little harder to cash flow in the north side, but the appreciation is quite significant. 

We also put a little bit of effort into SEO so that it would come up in searches for corporate or midterm housing in our pretty small market.

I'm not sure if this is part of the "Find Deals" feature here on BP, as I haven't used it myself.