As part of your due-diligence you will want to take a look at any existing lease and get the rent rolls if possible (payment history) so you can see if the current tenants are paying on time and how much.

Yes, and no.No for Cash:  Someone has to have cash, if you are buying all cash or partial cash (down payment).No for Credit:  If there is a loan involved where credit is a qualifying factor, someone must be able to qualify.Yes for Cash:  There may not be any cash involved, but if there is, it doesn't have to be your cash.Yes for credit:  There may not be any loans involved, but if there is, it doesn't have to be your credit that is used to get the loan(s).

I have about 35k I can put towards this project as a down payment and to fix up the house.

is your only reasonable assurance that the credit repair folks aren't just trying to squeeze the person for as many months of monthly subscription payments as possible (which should be your default assumption about any credit repair person or people). 

They might ask for some type of down payment just know that you have some skin in the game.

I put in the initial payment of 35k which I budgeted for and had the rest of the payments on a monthly basis.

If I can get a refi @ 80% LTV at the 85k, that's 68k and  around 2k out of pocket (+ home equity loan payments + interest) to pay back partner. 85% LTV would be even better.

Just be careful on payment as those transactions have no recourse, once you overpay and you don't like their job, you have no way of getting it back.

It's my understanding that hard money lenders aren't necessarily the formal businesses you might find online, but simply any person/entity willing to provide a short term loan, collateralized by property, and willing to take (mostly) interest only payments and defer full / majority repayment of the principal upon the term end.

As we are getting closer to the new year, I wanted to know if a January 2017 payment made in December 2016, would the interest on that payment be applied towards 2016 taxes, or 2017 taxes?