I would have to guess they easily spend six figures a year on marketing.

My best advice is to work with someone who has your best interests at heart and can easily plug you in with their network of trusted GCs, lenders, PMs.

Came across the area from a co worker as an out of state investor and realized that certain areas are able to hit the 1% rental target easily.

You have a HUGE bias in this your an investor who is worried about losing your investment ( which could very easily happen).

Resist the temptation of buying what your family wants and instead buy something you'll be able to easily rent when you move!

Instead of real estate assets, their heirs can receive easily divisible shares in the Operating Partnership that can be much more easily liquidated upon passing of the estate.

They also allow the seller to get a higher purchase price.If they want $25k for the land if it’s cash up front, they could easily get something like $12k down + $400 a month for 5 years at a 10% APR for an owner-financed sale.

You can easily incorporate language into your agreement of sale that allows the transfer of the sales contract to an LLC that has not yet been created. 

With regards to issues involving the contract, it's literally "Charlie Brown teacher" to my ears.Also, only offering MTM leases allows you to more easily mitigate a tenancy where someone is acting incongruent with your initial impression of them.

If you want to enter into a partnership where you bring the equity, focus on finding a partner who has demonstrated the ability to add value not as easily obtained through fee oriented services.