I dont know how long the court process would take there, but in Maryland it is at minimum 1 1/2 months plus eviction which could take 3 more weeks not to mention if you Lawyer up.

I keep hearing of homes that cannot be financed through traditional means due to condition deficiencies like broken windows, non-functioning kitchen, no running water, etc.

They cant sell it to you without court permission if they are actually in a BK.

On foreclosures, would I have to go to the county court & get the title of the property to make sure it's clean?

Use the search function to locate some people in your area.

Which in turn may be interpreted differently by different courts. 

In most cases, your fitness function is going to be so non-predictive, and all you need is "good enough to be profitable and low-maintenance" not "the very best in the pool".2.

Most lease agreements you will find online will be good enough but you will need to educate yourself on how to evict a non-paying tenant if you haven't already.Check rental history at a minimum by going on the district court website or using beenverified app on your smart phone. 

So I start checking court records and prior landlords. 

There are a lot of things about crowd funding, which have not yet been challenged in court an/or haven't gone through appeals.