However, when I see properties in north Tacoma that are being rented for $1500, my initial assumption (before probing the listing agent for 100 questions) is that the owner of the property acquired the property a good little awhile ago.

Its all about screening the tenants and verifying income and checking w/ prior landlords.

PM me for further ideas of what can be done to get a discussion initiated and get them moved out.

Is a visual inspection, unless required a more intrusive inspection which will be something specialized after your initial inspection, and will be done from a specialized inspector. 

Also, get at least 10% down from the end buyer which basically pays you back your initial money.

Just make sure any request does not initiate a 'hard pull' of your credit.Open more accounts.

The plan is to sell it with owner financing, and then selling that note as a partial to recoup our initial investment. 

We just initiate the 72hr notice at 72 hours, the eviction would be happening after that... by the book, exactly as we stated we would. 

@Megan RandolphThe closest is buy a non performing note, get it reperforming then sell a partial to get your equity back to reinvest in another deal and you will also keep payments on the back end.Example, buy a $30,000 UPB non performing loan that is paying $400/month with 120 months remaining 10% interestYou buy it for $15k, they start reperforming then you sell 15,000 worth of payments at 10% to investor which may be 60 months (numbers not verified and for example purposes).

Also what I find as that many investors buy outright because it makes the deal more attractive as leveraging the properties either initially or post closing would leave little to no cash flow.