For a wonky scenario like this, there is not going to be a cut and dry single answer.

If they let the tank run dry, it can cause significant damage to the heating system because the dried up oil gunks everything up for lack of a better description. 

The chief figure you want to know is the lineal feet of internal (and if required external) roads.Knowing the lineal feet, you can determine the COSTS associated with the roads themselves along with the wet and dry utilities that will run and be buried in the road beds.Take your plan to a SITE CONTRACTOR that can provide cost estimates for the aforementioned work.

It is a dry basement, but it's not finished and the stairs are narrow and steep.  

I’m fairly liquid and am keeping a lot of dry powder ready for whatever happens in the next 12 months.

Ceiling panels can be replaced quite easily and carpet can be dried out (you have a head start on steam cleaning!). 

the type of transaction Bill us referring to is a simultaneous closing, also called a dry closing where party B uses party C funds to close the A to B transaction.

They have pretty well dried up the market for deals in Atlanta, at least off the MLS, and they are paying retail prices or higher at times.I fully realize that you really can't generalize what the institutional investors are doing in SFRs any more than you can with the stock market.However, as I stated I had a limited knowledge base about these institutional investors that has been significantly expanded by several of the BP members who added to this thread.

But didn't the most deadly terrorist attack on U.S. soil in history occur under Bush's watch?

Some years they are dry and some years they are flooded.