Incredible that they were able to come up with the $20k originally but now can't pay their rent.Too bad you probably can't get a mortgage on this one to free up your cash again after you lock a new tenant in there.

If you want to get into the RE with your VA loan I would worry less about getting a under valued deal and just lock one up.

You can get a 30 year with a portfolio lender with little to no seasoning, but locking into a 30 year at 7% or so with points vs. waiting another month or two and taking advantage of some of the lowest rates in history should be a no-brainer (and I'm a portfolio lender/broker).  

I would rather lock up 30 year mortgages than wait on a lower price.

Also with the locking kind, what if i need to replace a piece in the middle because it was scratched up by furniture?

I generally recommend you keep them on a month-to-month for a few months to see how they perform and then lock them into a 12-month lease.

He even gave me the code to the lock box.

I wouldn't feel comfortable locking in a large investment in unchartered buy & hold investment water.

Dividends would be paid quarterly with the option to withdraw them at anytime or reinvest them for higher returns but the initial and core funds would be locked for a pre-determined amount of time (example: 1-5 years depending on the property.)

You'll lock money away for longer, but over time you'll earn more and can have CDs expiring at a set interval in case you need to fund some repairs or a new purchase.