You may be better off shopping around for a better deal.

This is one of the reasons I left the Big Box shop 5 years ago.  

A one-stop-shopping service is a good business concept. 

And am busy shopping around for the best deal.    

What you want is someone who will shop rates for you and handle the loan process in house.

I've also even considered adding my own business such as a coffee shop, but any restaurant requires architect plans and inspections and most likely an ancil system which costs minimum 10 to 15k. 

After purchasing the property, I would then take my time to shop for a good loan for the new property, to replace the HELOC funds. 

I'm in the process of getting licensed in VA and will be heading back to Fairfax to set up shop as a Real Estate Investor and who knows we may bump into each other on the metro.To answer your other question "Finding out if a property has a mortgage."

I grew up in New York and worked in Manhattan most of my career for a fortune 50 company that maintained building systems and my accounts were in the financial district (American Express, Merrill Lynch, Chase, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, Bank of NY, AIG Building) and I got to see first hand what 2007/08 did to people and that still scares me.

With the help of the professionals it was most efficient to create an American entity and bank account as to conduct all our business through that entity pay taxes there and then have it pay dividends to my Canadian side.