However, the tenant and partner, who originally stated they lived at the same address, had two different addresses on each driver's license, which raised some suspicion. 

Primary areas I am looking at (if that makes a difference) is Glendale, Goodyear, Avondale, Peoria, or Surprise.Any suggestions or recommendations for a real estate attorney that works primarily with residential?  

@Kermaury Musgrove no first-time story, but some education:)Every market is unique, but the Midwest markets have a lot of similarities and are way different than the market in California.In Metro Detroit, we rank all the suburban cities and the City of Detroit Neighborhoods as Class A, B, C & D.Recommend you first figure out the property Class you want to invest in, THEN figure out the corresponding location to invest in.If you apply Class A assumptions to a Class B or C purchase, your expectations won’t be met and it may be a financial disaster.So, when investing in areas they don’t really know, investors should research the different property Class submarkets.

I am not a computer engineer but it seems like it would be easy to toggle some popular amenities to segregate out the comps and get different projections, for example.

The only difference in your offer is the cash & where it comes from.

I suspect you will have other answers that are a variant of specific information and tips.One that is a little different that I'll toss out there: find someone that has done this before, that also has $250k+, that wants to be a mentor, and see if they will go in together with you.

So the asset class is different than investing in public ETFs and any publicly available list like that is not going to be comprehensive.Having said that...if you're interested in a private version of such a list then private message me. 

if ballooning, i would try a bank or CU who can do a standalone 2nd for you to pay off that $155k only... but something 30 year amortization. if its on another property, then... different conversation.

Different tax ramifications stem from each treatment.Not enough info in your OP to make that determination.  

There are some differences for sure but I don't think they are substantial.3) What laws should I watch out for (for example am I allowed to have the water/electricity be under the tenant's name) - You can put all utilities in the tenant's name, but I would advise keeping water in your name since that utility is a lien on the house itself.