Toledo stopped observing the CDC ruling when the 6th Circuit made it's ruling, so things are essentially back to normal now (but still on the slow side).

Most product is 2 to 4 units residential duplexes to quad's or much larger properties.In AZ some people are putting up non-refundable earnest money of six to seven figures depending on the deals.You will have to put in the time and make tons of calls.

A license might or might not be quick because they use covid or working from home as an excuse for slow down. 

Drafting letters and attorney calling is too slow of a process.

If there is currently a loan on the property, you should be able to rate term refi for a much higher LTV than the cash out limitation you cited.If you did it with cash, find a hard money lender that will give you a short term cash out type product and then once you have the lien recorded you can rate term refi it as above.Selling or leaving money in the deal is an option in either scenario.

I ended up turning one of my units into an AirBnB during the pandemic because I couldn't rent it out even after dropping rent $200.I still think if you have a nice product in a nicer area like Wicker Park you should be able to get it rented....really timing is everything and sometimes you are luckier than others.

Western University opened up in 2011 invited a large amount of medical students and other health services. the growth started a bit slow but seeing the success of the university and its efforts to expand investors are flocking this town.There are many more things going on in more towns but this post has gotten too long and I will leave the rest for another post.

I have an out dated porch in need of repair that I wanted to replace before the appraisal, cost of materials has really slowed progress.

And as for trying to find a different lender, I thought they all pretty much offer the same product so there’s no real reason to shop around?

I was certainly very hesitant to buy my first primary residence, but that hesitation really slowed down my wealth creation.