I worry that people will be inconsiderate about usage, running partial loads while others are waiting, etc.

Water heaters in Az Run about $400-$500 (12  year warranty, 40Gal, $499 at Home Depot) , and I can install it myself

you may be running into the negative perception of wholesalers who tie up property with no means to actually close. and if they cant assign the contract they walk . 

Also I think if I compare equal amounts of hard work at my job vs. running a real estate investment business, I will make more in the latter.

If it's below 10 homes rented last month run.  

Everything is finally in order and now I want to run at least 1 campaign before the big day to get the ball rolling again and possibly knock down a couple nice deals to help foot the budget :-)Anyways to the topic at hand...We have always used Yellow Letters . com to handle our marketing and so far the response has been about 2-3% - majority seem to be "tire kickers," so we are considering a little different approach.  

But, see next bit about working off-market sellers for a commission.If I am working with investors looking to flip and I source the property for them, I charge the off-market seller a small commission for bringing them the deal and I run the deal as dual agency to keep the transaction friendly and on track.

There is some type of gray line here which I'm toying with but, basically, it means that it needs to have running water, electricity, cabinets, sinks, shower, toilet.

Jason, A real estate market that just suffered a major hurricane is not your standard, run-of-the-mill stable market.  

Numbers are as follows:Purchase price - $185,000Rental income - $1,850 ($750, $750, $350)Insurance - $109/MoTaxes - $209/moCap ex - $185/moUtilities - $200moMaintenance- $185/ MoI feel confident the rents could go up to a total of $2350/Mo but current leases do not run out for another 6 months.