Originally, I thought I could use the extra yard space to build a garage/apartment and rent this out but this would cost upwards of $150k and I don't think would be worth losing my good interest rate with a construction loan. 

With relation to tax liens, I currently have a couple in Arizona.I purchased the liens after the auction (some juridictions have leftover liens that if they aren't won at auction, you can purchase outright - earning the highest level of interest available...18%). 

My humble two cents: Loan yourself the money, pay yourself interest, continue to earn cashback or miles, and be done with it. 

Out of curiosity if you've had success with apartments that lead to you having this extra $100k....why bother changing when you have a working recipe at this point? 

You will only be able to buy cash flow not earn it. 

Some banks do this as a way to build a relationship with a borrower and to bring in extra money.

I'm not talking RE investors, I mean people in the community that have money earning very low interest rates in CD, IRA's or savings accounts.

And with a good tenant buyer that is willing to pay in a little extra per month toward the down payment, you can get them to work... and ultimately collect your profit on the backend, or on the second and third lease option tenants if that plays out.The clear advantage of going this way is... if you dont find a "GOOD" lease option buyer, you are not obligated to the sellers... just let the bank take it like they were going to anyway.Pre-foreclosure lists are easy to find, and because getting a short sale completed is a numbers game there are often many sellers in that niche that could not get the short sale done, and are going to walk... you can cut your teeth on those until you get your system fine tuned.On a side note... the other way to go is to get a mailing list of absentee owners from your county tax rolls, or realquest.com.

it sounded to me like their biggest benefit was that if you tied up properties under their requirements, they had the buyer lined up and you would earn a fee, but if you build a good buyers list, you could do that and not have to give them 7000.

We have no other debt.My thought process is to pay off the rental property with the smallest mortgage as fast as possible with our extra cash flow, then use that rental income to pay off the next smallest mortgage of another rental prop, and finally when that property is paid off we want to use all the rental income to pay off our personal residence quicker so we can retire without this giant mortgage payment.