A good tenant would save you that 8%-10% fee and not create a ton of opportunity cost by eating up your time if you were managing it yourself.

I have never done a live in flip but imagine it would be hard without a place to eat or cook.

If I end up eating my words ill come back and post but so far so good! 

Should I just eat this one and learn from it?

Eating out?

If you don't end up taking away any wall, you could use the wall cabinet and countertop combo beside the stove with mirror behind it for a built-in eating area to make it somewhat useful.  

Working remotely across the country either requires putting a lot of trust into someone else or a lot of travel (which eats into ROI pretty quick).

I can't turn around and sell it without eating my tax credits.

And largely, the cost of that Operator to the Investor is what eats up much of the property's potential (non-Turnkey) profit!

Lots can go wrong and eat that 10% very fast.