Northwestern Illinois has traditionally been a good market for Lonnie Dealers as there are absolutely no street dealers in that part of the state, and smaller communities do not have strong sales programs to control their infill needs.

I'm a software engineer for a public company (I'd rather not say for privacy reasons).

Do I have to be a paid member of some website, go check county public records myself, or maybe pay a list service?

Chris, I don't want to give out specific names on a public forum, but it was sold to a buyer by an LLC as special warranty deed at the top of the bubble in 2006, and then quit claimed into a trust by that buyer a year later.

Again it could be a reasonable cost depending on what all they had to do.There are multiple issues here.1.Most of the items mentioned for repair should have shown up on an inspection of the property PRIOR to purchasing.In my mind if you didn't get a inspection from a 3RD party inspector not affiliated with the company selling you the property then these repairs are on you for not doing due diligence.2.The other component is that this property manager has their own crew.I don't like that one but and would never agree to it.Sometimes managers also get referral fees for giving business to skilled trades even if they don't have their own crew.The problem becomes then instead of getting the best rate they have to pad it a little to give back to the property manager for the referral.So either way I am sure the property manager is reaping a benefit monetarily from it.This way they make more than the lousy 50 to 60 bucks a month managing a property.This is why I am not a fan of "one off houses" in an area far away from where I live.This is why I like owning apartment buildings.I can find a full time highly trained manager easily and they use systems and programs to control cost and everything is documented.Since they only focus on management and are not a broker/agent doing transactions and then handling "rentals on the side" my properties get the focus they need to be ran properly.It just sounds like you purchased wrong and then on top of that have a property manager padding fees with the repairs.REO agents used to do this with banks.They wouldn't make much commission on selling the little dumpy houses so would have their company do the trashout,re-key,repairs and charge full market for it.Eventually the banks caught on and choosed their own company to perform tasks and only let the broker list the property for sale.Sometimes that works and other times it doesn't as the broker or manager is now dealing with outside parties they can't control saying work was completed properly and it wasn't.If you haven't had an inspection of the property I would do it now to see what all else might come up in the future so you can expect it and plan for it.

BTW-I’m following the “J Scott” program.

Assuming you decide to keep a property under the option to lease option and hold onto it for whatever reason ( maybe to exercise the option later for a profit on the back end) if the TB doesn't exercise it.If you are lease optioning and assigning, it is a non issue, if you are sandwiching, you disclose that you have clouded the title with the owner, and you want the TBer to exercise, assuming they have been signed up with a credit improvement program, they are eager to cooperate. 2.

Classified Ads in Newspapers – local paper, Pennysavers and local real estate publications (“For Sale by Owner”.)2.

So one can proactively go to the tax assessors' office in your city and do research to determine whether there is a lien or other negative report that would start a negotiation process this is public information -- superficial at first but then once trust is built  with a series of phone calls or visits -- request a "certified document on the first year status of the property in question and in relation to a tenant's payment history.

If you have a web site, you may want to have your policies publicly available.