Wondering how much analysis and research is sufficient to make an offer and what details/assessments are better saved for the due diligence stage?

So far it hasn’t hurt me with excessive vacancy periods and I really don’t put much time and energy into maintenance since they are doing their part.  

I would also suggest you invest early in an excess liability, or even better, an umbrella policy.I would recommend working with a knowledgeable independent agent to advise you on your individual circumstances.

I would assume that the excess will just sit in the account or it will be reimbursed back to you. 

If you do not need that excess capital, or foresee a scenario wherein the property would lose value... every day the capital sits, you take a long-term loss.

Appears that some sort of wire or cable may have went through the baseboard and was excessively hot/caught fire at some point. 

I am at the very beginning stages of trying to plan out how to approach this.

you may have to lower price on that one unit.. but that would be it and temporary.why would you spend 20k on clean up.. that seems excessive unless you just hired some company that is taking advantage of you.  

And another advantage of being an Investor/Realtor is that you may hear about deals that call you to list or even within your office that other agents are about to list and will bring to you first to see if you want to buy it.Most Realtors would like the easy route of selling homes to you rather than doing the listing expense of signs, staging, photography and marketing expenses.

I expect the bankruptcy filed has cleared the way for a clean slate and have heard the city is coming back and may be in the early stages of bouncing back.