Where I live in Los Angeles it is very common for a tenant to offer up-front money because the rental market is extremely competitive and good inventory is scarce. 

I was honing in on seller finance or a lease option but the market isn’t in my favor right now so my cold calls are like ice cold calls.

I decided to go the conventional route because with my savings at the time and my extremely average income level, that's what made sense to get me into a duplex.Hope this helps in some way!

The house is extremely distressed and needs a lot of work done.

Getting a contractor can be extremely frustrating especially if you need to make an offer without even looking at the property.

Find some phone numbers and start cold calling.

As to your question I have yet to make any contact, it was a driveby and I like the historical essence of the property, my realtor pointed it out to me so I thought I would make contact with the owner but not sure how to approach the situation. just got his name from the county website, this would be a cold introduction to say hey do you want to sell this particular property to me.

As you guys know, this market is extremely expensive.

Gary, I have done this technique in the past and would tell you it is extremely effective.  

Its an extremely basic deal that I wanted to use to kickoff my portfolio despite it being 1 unit when I wanted 2-5 units per acquisition.