Fastforward to today and I have enough equity to pay the lien off.

The response I received from the PM was that it's due to recent legislation where she's seen "professional" tenants take advantage of recent tenant protection laws that allow them to stay in the property without having to pay rent for the term of the lease. 

I provide tenants with a form to request any improvements and it spells out exactly what they are doing, what material will be used, who will do the work, who pays for it, what happens to it when they leave, etc.

You don't need a site or to pay anyone.

For example, in Florida, a landlord only has to give 3 days' notice to pay (excluding weekends and legal holidays) to the tenant, but the Zillow lease provides for more than 3 days.

The lease should dictate any free rent dates, so there should be no assuming involved.  2: If it is 100% occupied why are you paying any TI.  

How can I confirm that the tenant is paying on time and properly maintaining the property?

My main question is…i know i pay a deposit and we have an agreed upon term.

But with the array of services and fee structures current property management companies offer, it is entirely possible to pay an extremely low management fee and still be “fee-ed” to death as both an investor—and now even as a resident.Over the past 15 years, the amount of managers and fee structure variance in our industry has been incredible.

And if the right property is purchased you can recoup the money to pay back loan and any other start up costs to repeat the process.