How do I protect myself for properties that I have mortgages under my name? 

It's in CA, prop 13 protected, and I will never live at the property.  

Upon any complaint of a violation of this section, the Consumer Protection Unit of the Attorney General's office shall investigate the same, shall interview tenants of the landlord and shall, under appropriate search warrant, have the right to investigate all records of the landlord pertaining to applications made within the preceding 6 months.

Then I get to wait for someone to accuse of me of disparate treatment of a protected class or, preferential treatment to another class.

Just make sure you have standard protections in the contract. 

You hired them for their expertise in the first place, right?

We are often able to keep turn over costs in the $500 -$1000 range and that is for larger 2500 sf + single family homes, some of which have two story great rooms.My PM fees vary based on how many units an owner is giving me, and where the property is located etc, but are more than what you're paying but I probably include a lot more services.I offer performance guarantees, but there is no way I would have a Management Agreement that just allowed an owner to walk - they would owe me the remainder term fees if that happened.There is no way I would as an investor, pay tenant utilities at all - if the utilities were not separately metered, I would first determine if I could legally charge the tenants for the utilities in your area or I would not buy the property.There are many things you can do in a lease to protect yourself and reduce your costs (and that may be an issue with your PM's lack of experience - or it could be that your state is very landlord unfriendly) but here are a few items I would have in the lease if allowed in your area:The tenant must thoroughly clean the unit including any carpeting at move-out - we have a detailed example list of tenant cleaning responsibilities in our tenant handbook.We only accept the most financially highly qualified tenants, and often have tenants renew leases, but if a tenant wants or needs to break their lease early, there is a multi month Early Termination fee to help us defray off market time and turnkey make-ready costs due to early termination.Our tenants are responsible for both Pest/insect control and exterior landscape upkeep - though in an inner city townhouse/triplex set up tenant responsible landscape may not be feasible.

"Tenants Lease rights protected with the transfer of property ownership." 

That you'll likely need to do on your own unless you can offer some value to a partner here on the ground.I'd be shocked if anyone is going to just offer their time, expertise, and hard work to you simply because you asked (I personally won't).

Still, I'd be familiar with the protecting tenants at foreclosure act that was rekindled last year, for Federal rule guidance and then of course, your local or state rules as well.