I don't want to waste anyone's time and I don't want to start off with a bad reputation. 

Not great, but not bad either. 

On those websites, a listing that old is either the owner just trying to see what they could get or it’s a bad property (either economically or physically).

On one hand you want to be humane, but on the other hand bad tenants can make your life miserable chasing them for a few hundred bucks.

In the end they provided him with terrible quality work and the building was  discovered by the buyer/owners to have many defects and sued the seller in court and won a $1,750,000.00 award from the court.

@Bob Starlin When Mark Twain said 'Good decisions comes from experience and experience comes from bad decisions' he must have been thinking about investing in MF-we will never know for sure.

The rent will need to be a 'fair-market' rent, i.e. is it equivalent to what a non-related party would pay, or a similar rate as other SFR's in the area are charging.Additionally, for further proof of intent as an investment, it is never a bad idea to have a lease agreement with your tenant, whomever they may be.

Making the connections, meeting quality contacts, BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT....are all a part of that.

But once you say yes, if you have chosen a company that uses bad marketing data to attract clients - you could be in trouble!  

@Joe Hines that's not a bad idea, but there's some more upfront costs to marketing.