The only thing is my hard money lender bases payments off of draws in small increments.

Their representative is there to bid up to the upset price in small increments. 

Have prices rapidly inflated in your area?

Usually, you have a large Cashier's drawn on a local bank, with several $5,000 increment checks.

I would look for areas where homes are appreciating rapidly - like Nashville, TN, Charlotte, NC - or any other place, buy multi-family or single family homes there, invest some dollars in stocks like Amazon, Facebook, or Netflix, wait a few years after appreciation and sell the home (s) for a profit. 

Rapidly improving neighborhood.

On the other hand, asbestos usage peaked in the 1970s, then fell rapidly to almost none by the late 1980s.  

I'm currently analyzing properties in he battle creek, Jackson and Grand Rapids region.

Stay away from the resort areas or one horse towns in Michigan but Detroit (Suburbs), Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing all seem like bargains.

For the Des Moines Metro area, these are rapidly growing areas and there is much growth in the commercial markets there...