If they are on a month-to-month lease (or a verbal lease, which is automatically month-to-month), then you can terminate them for any reason by serving them with a 30-day notice (check state law, some require more).

Until you have a decent sized porfolio, I recommend sticking to one or two niche specific markets.

It's really going to be hard to provide any realistic feedback without knowing the size of the property, the quantities of work and more details on the specific repairs and location of the project.How many square feet is the property? 

I am looking to get into multi family, I got a commercial property conversion into a 12 plex under contract now, and I am looking for more deals that size to get started.

Or start with a larger 1bed/1bath and pare the price down based on size.

It's never one size fits all and it takes practice and patience.

What size projects are you looking at; ground-up; renovations; re-development?

The amount of things that can go wrong are too many to count, especially when you have unknown unknownsI think whether you are doing it yourself or not should be determined by the size of the project.

My second thought is to have the sheriff serve them anyways for late and unpaid rent, to let them know I mean business.

I find it alarming that a trustee either doesn't know the bylaws or is purposely breaking them to serve their own interests.