US Bank has a 10% down product for 2-unit primary residence purchases, but that is about as aggressive as you'll get on anything that isn't FHA.

It's good to keep the 401k to show reserves to the bank in the future in order to qualify for more conventional mortgages.

The PM uses Appfolio and when trying to set up the ACH transfer to deposit rents to a bank account in NY, Appfolio (which is based in CA) stated to my PM that they can not do ACH transfers to NY because of 'NY Banking Laws' but they didn't provide to her further information on that.Has this happened to anyone else whose PMs use Appfolio or other similar app to get deposits from Out of State to NY or any other state?

I would think in most states the foreclosure would wipe all of the other liens out and require the bank to pay taxes, but I'm not sure.

Once my remaining commissions come in this year I will be at around $315K cash in the bank.  

It's an option that can be used to get into the business, but if you should do it can only be determined by you and your husband, possibly with the help of a CPA or similar professional. 20-45k is generally enough to get started, depending on what you're getting into and where you are.If you are going to be risking your primary residence with a HELOC, my suggestion is that you make sure you could handle the possibility of that money going into a failing investment and getting lost.

At this point I can tap bank loans for much more favorable terms so I should probably hold off on any seller-financing deals until that no longer becomes an option.Overall, the deal seems lose/lose.  12.5% locked in for that long does seem like a low ROI for the seller (especially considering interest rates will likely rise significantly in that time), yet still too high for me for cash flow purposes.

Well it was a foreclosure, so there were delays on behalf of the bank.  

So as most people, I started buying property the tradition bank/ conventional way, with personal credit and guarantee. 

Once it goes through foreclosure, the judgment value is likely to be higher than the price the property is worth and it will end up going to the bank.