You also may want to check out a few other potential costs (code compliance, insurance, property/income tax consequences), as well as doing some reading/research on landlord-tenant law, just so you know exactly what you're getting into.

They just decided to adopt a single code so no one has to remember it's always that code?

I am planning to get an absentee owner list for 2 or 3 zip codes in my area (Dallas), with >50% equity via Listsource, and start a 6 month campaign, mailing once per month, alternating yellow letter and postcard.

Around here if the electric meter has been removed, you have to get reinspected to get it turned on... that inspection requires it to be to current code, not the code of 1955 (when my house was built).

Contact any of these people to see if the estate has property for sale.Often estates will be coded for size or whether they contain any real property this can help narrow your search.

No, it does not sound like fraud merely because the buyer was in the middle of a tax-deferred exchange transaction pursuant to Section 1031 of the Internal Revenue Code and then backed out.

Insurance isn't bad either compared to other areas (it has a good fire protection class code).

In your lease, you should have rules about what you can hang and what alterations they can make- so this would obviously prohibit people from hanging anything on the exterior of the building which would warrant using a ladder.

One has outstanding code violations classified as "Non-Hazardous" by L&I.

You can find BP members by clicking "Network" then find members" and search by your zip code.