I've learned a ton from her posts here on BP and have called her to pick her brain on market rents in specific areas I'm not as familiar with and have limited MLS rental data in Orlando.

Your contractor is correct, however you should still collect a W-9 from him that indicates his full legal name and S-Corp status along with the signature for your records. 

My poor credit and collections account are a huge roadblock when it comes to the funding part of my journey.What I'm hoping for is someone who walked my path and found success.

If they dont have a practice or policy in place for your secure data then I recommend using somebody else.

A better way with single family homes is to buy them and then become a "lease option" owner who does financing to good people that have not qualified with a Bank and do not know about the alternatives and they will usually take better care of the home because they think they will own some day, collect a larger non-refundable deposit, the monthly spread between your payment and the rent during that period, and then make money on the sale option.  9 times out of 10 they usually do not purchase the home but you can do it again.

Then you start collecting names and "soft commitments" of the amount of money people would invest if you found the right deal.  

I get the whole 1.market to motivated sellers 2.put house under contract 3.market to buyers  4.find buyer 5.collect check.

You're talking about selling a lease option contract (assignment) but also collecting payments (sandwich).

@April MolinaYou can find case shiller data on below link.

There's tons of data out there, but you'll likely be in the center of the country where real estate hasn't already exploded.After picking a market, I'd get some contacts in that market.