If that is the case, you could offer them an extension on the option for another year (if they have money, but not good credit) to give them time to fix their lending issues. 

If I show the VA proof of the lease in place, will they allow this extension?

That means visiting all the public real estate sites, tax records, gathering all the comps you can but understand that if you bid on the house it’s likely you won’t get the winning bid unless your bid exceeds the reserve.I won the bid on a current property and they failed to clear all of the liens and asked for an extension.

You may want to file an extension if you are unable to find an accountant soon.

I recommend filing an extension and searching after the deadline passes.

Please note that you are obligated to pay back their 401k (regardless of the performance of your real estate investment).Per the loan offset rules that went into effect with the 2018 Tax and Job Act: if you leave your job and the loan is current at the time you leave your job but then the loan goes into default because you left your job, you will have until your tax return deadline (including any timely filed extension) to make the loan current by depositing the outstanding balance into an IRA (and thereby avoid the taxes and penalties that would otherwise apply).If you are self-employed with no full-time employees & you can rollover the funds, you could set up a Solo 401k, rollover the funds and take a 401k loan from the Solo 401k.

My background is in hospitality management/tourism and now finishing up the interior architecture program at UCLA extension (this summer!).

Not impossible to find, as I did score a pretty sweet deal that I'm developing right now, but I'm not using any heloc and just using funds I've been setting aside to develop this deal.Basically I would just do your due diligence, look into airdna.co and buy reports on zipcodes you're interested in and do extensive research on the area from one bedrooms to 4 bedrooms and compile all the data from 50th to 90th percentile listings so you can come up with averages overall and see if it will pencil enough that even with a downturn you'll still be sitting pretty.

As anyone from this area knows they go quick and most need extensive work.

@Oleg Shalumov The properties I'm looking at don't require extensive rehab that will take a long time to complete, I've factored in ample time of holding cost and I have a good amount of reserves, not enough to pay the HML off but I can borrow the rest to pay off the loan if need be.