Your best bet is to find a lender that will allow you to close in the entity (My company allows it, even a brand new LLC but only on investment and max Loan to Value is 75% so there are drawbacks).

But trustworthy boots on the ground will almost always be your best bet.

@Tanner Marsey Not for nothing, but you should take a sample property on the market and pop it into the BP calculator to show how it's going to break even for you. 

I think it’s better to rent, but if you’re fixed on buying, I think getting roommates in a townhouse would be the best bet.

You'll be able to find out how much a bank liened when the property was sold and you could probably estimate monthly payments since then- just use an online amortization calculator.

That's a rough story with your GC I bet that's a common story.

@Rod Hanks, I've lightened up my calculations and have been seeing quite a few more deals (Funny how that works!).

After taking the cost of replacing the roof accounted in the cash flow calculation I got 6% cash on cash and that was a deal breaker!

Two problems with this outcome:major audit flag on zero-income Sch Cinstallment income improperly escapes SE taxMy solution is to manually calculate installment income and enter it on Sch C, forgoing 6252. 

Request the tenants leave, flip to 3 bedroom, and rent to new tenants at $986If I convert from  2 BR to a 3 BR, I've calculated a payback period of 2.3 years... here's the high-level of how I came to that number:Annual Opportunity Cost:3 BR vs 2 BR Rent = $2,790My Time (expect less needy tenants) = $1,183TOTAL OPPT COST= $3,973 <-- This is a favorable numberCost to get unit ready as 3 BRTotal to flip = $7,551 (includes paint, new floors, converting basement to bedroom, etc)  2 Months lost rent = $1,510 TOTAL UPFRONT COSTS $9,061 <-- This is an unfavorable numberPayback Period =  $9,061 / $3,973 = 2.3 years (Note if I'm conservative in my nubers, this becomes 3 years)Couple more things to note, they're set up on re-occurring payments and have not missed a payment.