I went through the same painful process of losing money to few so-called private lenders/scammers.

I used the process described above and that apartment still smells brand new today.

I am aware of the individual trade licensing and the permitting process.

Are you asking about a bank owned property, or a property currently in the foreclosure process.

My name is Matt, I recently moved to Houston and would really like to get into the local investment scene. 

So we did live in it for 71 days last year before moving from the state, so it was technically only available for rent for 294 days...and out of those days it actually had renters for 151 days.

I don’t plan on moving out anytime in the near future. 

I just moved to Phoenix/Tempe from Boston (learned about the price to live in that city the hard way haha) and I'll be finishing my finance degree at Arizona State.

Does anyone have any experience / can advise on the process in each of these counties?

I would suggest checking out janover.co for financing, worked with them and the entire process was great.