C Meddy,I use a guy in OC that charges a very fair rate and also owns rental properties himself.  

I am fairly comfortable doing the inspections, but I would happily pay an inspector to lend an extra set of eyes.

The two cities are fairly close geographically, but the markets, demographics, etc. are so different.  

The best way that I know of to avoid making yourself a target for a lawsuit is conducting your business (whether it is in your name or a LLC) in a legal, fair, honest, professional, and rigorous manner.

@Ashley Wolfe  its very nice of you to ask... however your broker only gets paid if they represent you and write the contract for you.. ( unless you have buyers brokers arrangement which are fairly rare).So when you have an agent working for you and you feel they are bringing value make sure you use them to make your offers on listed properties..Nothing worse to an agent then to work with someone only to have that client go direct to a listing agent and cut them out and the buyer is not cognizant of how this crush's your agent.

I am fairly new to this site and the industry as I have made the decision to follow my dreams.

In AZ it is fairly simple to get information from the assessors office if you find an address different from the physical location of the house you might have a place to start, you can also see if it owned by a Trust which will obviously change the probate aspects

I have done my fair past as a remodeler and hope to advise you in the future.  

I am fairly new to real estate investing.

Do you still "play fair" and wait the three more days to show it to Person #1?