With all that being said if it's not already been agreed you will likely be legally obligated to honor the property management contract and the tenant contract until you notify them or intent to terminate or terminate and resign under more favorable terms for yourself. 

Why not stack the investing cards in your favor and invest where it makes sense? 

Definitely do not ask them to be your mentor, rather find a way to add value to their lives and they will be happy to return the favor.

Pick someplace that you can drive or fly to roundtrip in a day if you can or where you have some friends/family nearby to provide insight, stop by as a favor to you, or even serve as an "excuse" for you to go yourself when you visit them.Feel free to DM me with any questions.

No, they are doing the seller a favor by advertising upfront how incompetent they are and can safely be ignored. 

They're not doing you a favor by taking care of the house.

We need government and I am happy it exists.My position is:We shouldn't carve out new taxes that generate more bureaucracy and less efficient government operation targeting small groups of people when we could more efficiently increase the tax that already exists and split the responsibility among taxpayers proportionately to the already progressive tax system.Does your position remain in favor of the new wealth tax?

The owner is about to retire so probably willing to negotiate.He is having trouble getting rid of the property since he did a favor to a friend of his more than a year ago, and he moved in market rate tenants (friends of his friend, which he now really regrets) who stopped paying last year -- it is the 4bd apartment and it has been in eviction process since last June (2019).

And that is one of the arguments in favor of the refi - it's not a taxable event.  

If you are strong enough to survive, the classic supply/demand will be in your favor.