List all apartment amenities, possible local attractions/neighborhood features and what is included in the rent/not included. 

Also.. with any luck, local meetings will have people doing actual investing around the area and hopefully can give you documents that have been used in that area, or if you notice there are no active meetings around you, you could always start one and see who it attracts.

Is it better to do a small increase and increase my chances of them staying?

Rehab the kitchen and whatever else to make it a more attractive rental and then refinance or get a HELOC to pull the money back out for a down payment on a new house?

Office space and housing  rents are increasing.

Your incentive for the deal is the value-add perspective (raising rents to market and Rehab to increase appraised value).  

Clearly it has become known as a growing city that is attracting a young, college-grad crowd - but do you think it has peaked?

Has any marketing been done to try and attract more people?

To save $1080, your tax burden increases plus you'll get to take less depreciation while you own it.I've had great results not getting a buyers agent at all.

I'm wondering what other strategies on top of aggressive pricing others are having success with when it comes to attracting buyers to your resale listing and away from new construction.One thought that I have had is to add a BTSA for the buyer's agent.