This would have been difficult to achieve with 3rd party management, as they are simply not capable of executing on the value-add component. 

Whether the owner is living or dead is not an essential component, at least not in CA. 

A primary component of a property manager is to stay in constant communication with the owner of the property as to the economic performance of the asset, and that includes everything from maintenance costs to evictions.

You should be going into the project with your eyes open in enough time to make revisions to the component in the project.

This coinvestment is what mitigates the risk of the other party taking risks that could be a detriment to the investor.

Its likely you'll be able to find a place that has some of those components that don't need to be touched for quite a few years.A conservative approach when analyzing a deal is one thing, but if you model only the downside, you can make almost any deal look bad.

Is there a value add component or are you just buying cash flow?

There are companies you hire to do it or you can do it yourself by understanding what goes into a credit score and working on the components.2) Get a partner with a decent credit score.

Surely I’m missing some key component here?

If you're building in the urban core where it will be mainly younger, single tenants, then having 2-3 BRs could be detrimental.