Mark Douglas IMO: bad time to get into market now, especially for new investors, 2017.Experienced investors may still be able to find deals.

Is it a bad thing?

How can we best equip ourselves now to take advantage of this huge change that is barreling towards us? 

You will probably get people saying that's a bad idea but I've read of cases where it worked out.But definitely see what you would get approved for and go from there .

For my smaller places I buy a 4-roll pack of acceptable lower quality t.p. for each toilet. 

I was managing a property that had the same thing happen, and the HOA was on the ball; however, the bad part was that they whole time the construction was in progress they had to stick to the city permitting process.

When they try too hard, impose too many rules, it might be good for owner occupants, but really bad news for the condo landlords.

The reason we have those statutes is because of bad actors. 

My thinking is either the owner is in bad shape, doesn't need to manage the property, or just had had enough.

Check and proactively replace all of the toilet flappers and check flushing mechanism to make sure its flushing efficiently. the flapper(s) could have likely degraded and the bad seal might slowly leak into the bowl and cause a frequent refill of the tank. flappers usually need to be replaced every 5 years anyway since they degrade. toilets have always been a cause for high water usage in one of my condo buildings.