If you can find a good foundation Contr, they may be have a SE in-house or be able to do it without....

I feel like this might be necessary to have a better sense of how to talk to the GC about planning and what type of conversation I should be having at a given point in time..   

If the property is in as much distress as you say, it's possible the owner might be having trouble making the payments (assuming there is a loan) they might be facing a preforclosure situation but you won't know until you make contact with the owner.

My thought would be, having been an owner occupier in all three of those buildings I mentioned, and still an owner occupier, is that if you're going to be broken by the cost of the POS repairs, then you're not ready to take on a rental property.

(behave...)  

The best bet would be have him join you on title and make a side letter agreement to pay him back and then you can Quit Claim off of title.

Of all the problems that I could be having on the rehab of a house for a buy & hold, I find myself stewing over the cost of a bathroom vanity.  

But I believe he'd be have a passion for flipping if someone else were taking care of virtually everything except for the GC part of the equation.  

I may simply be having a brain fart, but can someone please explain to me how to do this?

For the down payment, we could take out extra on a student loan at an 8% interest rate (we will be having to take out another one for next semester anyways) and use that.