And I would suggest setting the end of your lease to occur in May, June or July so that it coincides with the school year better. 

It never occurred to me that I may need money if the roof starts to leak.  

Never even occurred to me this was small, because I moved here from a 400 sf condo and here I've got around 1000 sf, plus a basement.

Many of us in the business have done this,, do this , and will continue to do it.In my mind true NMD is buying an asset with no partners and putting none of your own money into the deal.. which usually occurs in some sort of Sub too or owner finance deal.

There's generally no harm in trying to talk to the occupant prior to the auction, but keep in mind you need to be pretty polite about it and if they ask you to leave you need to get off the property.  

The investment never occurred and could in the future but it isn't looking good.  

I don't recall hearing that occurring in our circles.

-Check out http://www.evicttv.com/categor...To protect your interests once an incident occurs and/or you do get sued:-LLCs and other entities can limit your exposure, but aren't always feasible (for example, when using conventional financing properties may need to be titled in your own name).

We don’t know any PMCs to recommend in the area mentioned, but since selecting the wrong PMC is usually more harmful than selecting a bad tenant, you might want to read our series about “How to Screen a PMC Better than a Tenant”:https://www.biggerpockets.com/member-blogs/3094/91877-how-to-screen-a-pmc-better-than-a-tenant-part-1-services-and-processesWe recommend you get management contracts from several PMCs and compare the services they cover and, more importantly, what they each DO NOT cover.

Little house LLCs for asset protection cause more harm than prevent.