If sellers interest rate % is low enough actual buy price isn't so critical.

The Key Team Member ElementIntegrity is THE critical characteristic for all investment team members.

Two address your two criticisms:1) Over the long-term (10-30 years), it is extremely difficult to leverage your stock portfolio.  

@Chris WillsonWelcome.At our Movers and Shakers meeting last Friday 8/8, one investor complained that when he went to Craig's List and communicated with three different contractors, None showed up or gave him estimates.However there were four at our meeting and two gave him estimates then and arranged to meet him at the property the next day.You're right, Contractors are critical Especially local in Boston, Massachusetts!

I suggest finding a few of the top selling realtors for your neighborhood, get an opinion, or three , will get you closer to a real arv then any average calculations you can do, as well as you will find out critical factors to consider, such as, in order to get your price you need to ad an extra bath, etc.

Whatever is critical to their decision-making and yours.

As far as the other deposit, there should be no problems transferring it to the new PM, and the new PM can probably help you contact whatever state agency monitors those transactions as states usually are very critical about how security deposits are handled, so you'll probably have plenty of backup if he tries to keep your other deposit.   

OTH, if there is a significant down on the deal and credit issues are not critical, a straight up option could be more appopriate and equitable.

And what I see happen on a pretty regular basis is this: your marketing reaches a point of critical mass with that first deal.

Please be critical and let me know if this is something that you would buy and why!