So that was less than ideal but at least I didn’t have to evict them

ideally the contractor's expertise is doing contractor items including rehabs. 

Remember you have a duty to be an expert where you assist people...no matter if that is Washington or somewhere else. 

I deal in the home building processes with my current full time career, and would love to get my first deal on the move.

You can also contact local wholesalers and join their buyer's list for off market properties that would be ideal for a buy and hold investor like yourself.

If your deal needs rehab work and the value will be increased substantially then a short term loan would be ideal. 

The lot would be ideal for a modest 1,500 sqft, 3-4 bed/2 bath home.

So here we missed one payment in this example, but our credit report actually shows 3x30 day lates.Like @Harjeet Bhatti said, you're probably cut off from the gov't subsidized Fannie/Freddie stuff for an investment property for a year or so.However if you come across something, and it's such a screaming deal at that price that it still makes sense even with non-ideal financing (remember that if you have to choose between the two, killer price is better than killer rate -- as any successful flipper will attest to), there's a lot of "Alt-A" (once upon a time called "sub prime") that's come out just in the last year that's better than HML.

Does anyone remember the podcast episode where the guest described a unique/alternative way that they took their profit, after the investors got paid?

This was around June of last year I cant really remember.