In a very bad scenario, the structure is damaged, the land value is reduced (I heard that happened after one of the previous earthquakes here before) and there is still a mortgage payment every month with no rental income.

I also haven't seen sellers reduce the price.

We've currently reduced it to 2375$ after we havent had much luck.We've had maybe 10 people interested in the past 2 months that connect by email and never return any emails and 3 showings.

I'm pretty sure the smell (and maybe the obvious termite damage) led to the reduced sale price.After closing, my wife went down to kick off the rehab on the house.

That money has to come from somewhere, so I reduce my offer price and let the seller cover some of that cost.When analyzing a purchase, I also include a monthly allowance in my own pro-forma to cover maintenance and upkeep.  

This will reduce your applicant pool from 2,400 to 24.)14.Odesk suggests you just advertise the job and ask for “bids”.

One SFR through a realtor, and one SFR with a FSBO.My question is, can I close both of these at the same time to reduce closing costs, or am I going to have to pay twice?

Selling as is you simply reduce the asking price by how much the repairs will be, is that right?

What would be a fair way to split the cash flow, factoring in reduced or free rent for him (and which option is fairer?)

It just doesn't add up ... unless he's just reduced the price on account of the divorce ... and even then the ex/wife's representatives are likely to block a sale too far below market.I'll be interested to see how this plays out.