If the mortgagee is a natural person, I suspect that is as good a lead as any.

I have helped with an institutional tax lien portfolio before and I can tell you that a lot of metrics used for typical investments can be tough when used for tax liens because of the unique nature of the flow of funds.

I am looking to develop my own portfolio of homes to develop passive income, and figure it would be a natural fit since I am already a property manager.  

Hard money is a natural start in notes in my opinion, some class time is a good idea too, I really learned a lot from Gary Johnston, Clyde Wilson and Jimmy Napier seminars.

By nature it would be hard for a turn key provider to sell a quality product and still hit the profit margins.Often these properties are older in nature.

We have a big back round in rehabs, flips and construction from the contractors stand point, it seemed natural to cross over into the other side of the business. 

Thats the nature of the business . 

We are reaching out to him to explore just what you mention - retaining the exterior facade and incorporating enough to the interior - particularly the trompe l'oeil - to pay respect to the history of the building.Senior living is an avenue we are exploring, but might be cost prohibitive if an elevator need be incorporated.We dismissed B&B - the property would be fitting, but they are in abundance already and some of the older, more established ones are struggling these days.If it wasn't for the fact we have real winters here and 6500 ft^2 of this age costs ~10-12K to heat - we could experiment with less risk.The purchasing of this property will undoubtedly be the least costly aspect of a deal.

Either way, I think I have to incorporate here in Florida or pay twice as foreign entity through the state.

You can naturally defend yourself against any claims, but w/ Title Insurance the Title Company becomes your "third party" defender.