All cash deal and my question is if we have the paperwork that proves the home was left to our seller will title accept this and push the deal through without her name on the deed or do we need to do probate court, lawyers etc to get the deed into our sellers name???? 

Please answer in details suggestions and opinions, I don't want to spend 30-100k in graduate studies when t can be used for more profitable stuff (Mom is pushing to due graduate studies).

Should I feel comfortable going ahead and bidding on these properties or is there a way to dig deeper without digging into my pockets ?

You're likely looking at property taxes pushing  $8k a year or higher. 

I went ahead and made the necessary adjustments and was able to find numbers that were a lot better than what was posted here. 

Option 2 is a higher/better price but has the closing pushed out 5-6 months until the ground has already thawed.If you're confident about your numbers then I think those are the two main choices.

On one hand it's a good news that there will be new opportunities coming to Memphis with the new Ford Electric Vehicle plant. 
I think it could potentially challenge the West Tennessee real estate market as it will n...

I feel like they'll appreciate that a lot and treat you well. 10% would be pushing it.

Is it possible to "hire/rent" somebody's brokerage license to that they could be my broker-of-record but I can go ahead and build my PM company as I see fit?

Would you go ahead with purchase ?