It seemed like a good price for the amount of rental income it generates, so I made a full price offer contingent on the seller paying $2500 in closing costs.

If you make a cash offer, and waive the appraisal contingency, you will need to close regardless of what the home appraises for.

That being said because of your jobs you should have your time well planned out for who is going to deal with the construction people and have a contingency plan for when things go wrong.

@Kyle Gilbert I agree with the group here...in difficult situations or with combative tenants it may make sense to issue LOI or even a contract with a contingency...so, get in the units you can, get the property secured with a LOI/contract, and then leverage the seller to see every inch of the property before you can remove the contingency and close the deal...It's amazing the lengths some tenants will go to in order to prevent a deal from happening out of fear of the unknown...it's good to have leverage on the seller to assist with getting in the units if they want to sell the property.

And it really depends on what you do for a living.. as you grow in the business net worth and contingent liabilities are what bankers look for and those that always peg max debt the bankers look at much harder..

IE "Contingent on borrower receiving comemercial financing at 80% LTV at an interest rate of 12% or less."

This is a good strategy because you can pay cash, and the deal isn't contingent on obtaining a mortgage.

If it happens to be the asking price, great, but I usually go with option B (lower price), but offer cash and no inspection contingency. 

If there are tons of contingencies and pocket change for earnest money....we usually know what that means, right?

I lost quite a few offers to cash buyers (I was purchasing through a local bank).I switched it up with the help of my agent and started putting in offers with a 10 day inspection contingency period (this rule may change based on your state?)