@William Hochstedler @Abdul AzeezI'm in agreement with all three of you -- it seems when playing the long game, as I am -- the weight is on leveraging wisely, letting tenants carry that load, and expanding your risk profile across as many properties as you can "afford" to meet your cashflow goals.  

Maybe the margins on your rentals aren’t great in his eyes, maybe with your real estate success taxes are going to be an issue, maybe he’s anti debt accumulation, maybe hes unaware that some markets didn’t react like CA during the last recession, maybe you are heavily weighted towards real estate and he’s just trying to get you diversified more.

All I like to do is being involved in the selection process on the front end as well as the closer monitoring for the vacation rentals.

Some tenants were afraid of losing their home so it was a lot of weight off their shoulders and it ensured we were off to a good start.3) Getting every tenant's information.

So you need to have your Approach loaded into the auto pilot you need to know the weather you need to know your final landing weight speed decision height and go around protocol and that has to all be briefed before the approach lest you run into a sea wall in clear blue skies with no wind or weather.Its really exciting to do these last minute deals but you need to be fully prepped otherwise your just waisting a lot of time and energy on something that has no hope of happening. 

If it's local, you can easily check references, meet face to face and monitor the situation. 

It is probably fine because you aren't putting much weight on it, but the original home might only have had a slab and not designed to hold an addition.If this is a labor only deal, is it per-hour or complete job? 

They didn't sell last year, and I kept monitoring them.

They can supply you with local numbers that can be monitored. 

In the meantime.... find a mentor, and offer to help them with stuff, a mentor can be worth their weight in gold, and real estate is all about connections, so while it may not buy you a house, investing in a friendship with a good mentor will help you a lot down the road!