I am evaluating a residential rental property and the owner, who has a business separate from the rentals, apparently leases a building on the property (not a rental unit), out to himself for an office for his other business, (this building could be rented out as an office so he is not calling it something that its not). 

Any citations for violations I receive I gift to them, as per the lease.

Nothing exciting* Contacts - people that are in properties and or have been historically* Leases - term, amount, contact and the signed agreement* Files - closing docs, appraisals, insurance, etc. grouped by Property* Income - amount, date, property, attachments, category (rent vs lease option fee, etc)* Expenses - actual expenses, date, property, attachments (mortgage, capex, maintenance, turn, etc.)* Reserves - savings from each rent payment for future expensesIf you wanted to use more like a PM, you could set up an online form for tenants to input requests and include attachments and track maintenance through it.Hope that helps.PS - I still use Excel for projections/modeling

This begs the question of whether it's more profitable to do long term rental leases or short term vacation rentals or even an Airbnb setup for these properties.The main reasoning here of course is the still very depressed prices offering high potential for return.

They came to me together wanting to rent the house, passed all screening, and signed a year lease.

So on the lease it includes her and her now ex husband.

The PM fee was 7%, but worked out to around 8-8.5% after leasing fees.

you can do one of several things. you can include electric in the rent (not always a good option) , you can stipulate, in the lease, that the electric bill is split 50-50, you can implement RUBS which divides the bill into the percentage of space it takes up (for example one side is bigger so they pay 60% of the electric, or the 2 bedroom pays 66% and the 1 bedroom pays 33%), or you can submeter the electric which allows you to split the bill you receive according to the actual electric used, finally you can discuss with your electric company what needs to be done to add a separate meter to the duplex. submeter and second meter are most expensive options, but in my opinion are the best for your long term sanity and profit.

you take yearly rents and divide by 52.Whats the lease/contract state?

This happens to me all the time in residential leasing when working with a tenant.