Between the urine, hair, and claw sharpening on all the woodwork they can really destroy a place.I would probably pass if your main plan is to put a highly allergic person in it, but if the numbers work out well and you can rent it to an animal lover it might not be a bad deal.

The poor sellers in these transactions lose control of their properties and end up in all sorts of financial turmoil. 

It takes special kind of seller for this sort of deal.Are you providing your seller with the over market rental income and making sure that buyer pays operating expenses for the option period?

@Kyle Kelley As @James Wise mentioned above, you do have to tackle this one in person for Ohio - I've looked and messaged James the same question some months back.I would recommend reaching out to the various institutions that offer these courses and see what sort of schedule they can offer.  

What sort of financing can you arrange?

That's a hard money lender of some sort.  

Maybe you can adjust the rents to the $1,000-$1,300 market range that you mention, once the current tenants' terms expire, but I would probably expect some sort of compensation (price reduction) from the seller for the inherent negative cash-flow situation upfront and for ultimately having to turn both units over within the first year.It couldn't hurt to get in and at least check out the interior of the property if it still interests you at this point.

You must consider not just the tenant provided when you buy, but also what sort of tenant base you will have in the future.  

But some sort of discount seems legitimate.

Option 3:  We set up some sort of entity, buy the property 50/50, and split costs and the profit.