How do you find the best deals in a competitive market like Texas?

Your next steps are to find financing or sell it before the balloon pops.

This negative position can consume years of cash flow to recover.

The numbers provided are cash-flow negative so that doesn't help.

I've told my wife I'd rather cut the losses at this point since now we have to refinance again, pay about $10k-$12k of closing costs, find a new general contractor who can work with us in a timely manner, and still the run the risk that anything can further go wrong.

Investing in new construction can make sense here given the strong appreciation and you end up leveraging basically the same amount of cash and have an asset that's not 60+ years old or more. 

what is the best way to fund renovations on a flip project (other than cash)hard money lender, line of credits, credit cards?

Sadly, it’s sat on the market too long and I’m looking to get creative with bringing the attention of many buyers looking for a good deal on a property (online auction or something else with tons of attention??)

I don’t want hard money lending since cost is too high and I have the cash to pay it if I want to. 

That being said, I think there might be an opportunity for this program to be expanded as the the politicians seem to finally be understanding that they need to do something to fix the lack of supply of new construction homes and I'm thinking this program may end up being a part of their solution.I've tried finding some real meat/details on the program but all I can seem to find is the broad strokes at a really high level.