I assume you mean as the homeowner leasing to a tenant/buyer, vs a traditional rental to a tenant? 

The plan has always been traditional rentals.

@Rich Somers how many units in total are you talking about?

A trashed property won't qualify for traditional lending, so automatically I start thinking about the hard lending.

Been looking for 2 years now in Philly and I've always been very close to buying. 40k to 80k for either 1. buy single family for rental on Airbnb or traditional 175k to 250k purchase price with 25% down looking for 8% CoC return 150-200 per door. ( open to the midwest etc )2.

The problem (if I’m hearing you correctly) is you don’t have money to qualify for a traditional mortgage in your name for $150k.

The area shows strong support for traditional and short term rentals, so if we find the student side of the market doesn't fit well with our operation we have options.

We currently have enough saved for a 15% down payment for our next rental property. When I called the bank to get pre-qualified they told me that we are able, but are very close to being denied because of our debt to ...

Or they have a ton of money because they are an investor and keeping 10-15% of a $100k property to owner finance to someone probably isn't worth it in the time it takes to keep track of, not to mention the bank may not like that if you go with a traditional loan.

To get the ball rolling, I've listened to many of the BiggerPockets Real Estate podcasts, I'm reading Brandon's book; Rental Property Investing and listening to Rich Dad, Poor Dad on Audible!