If the tenant pays rent after filing, he reaffirmed the obligation and you can ask the tenant's attorney if they intend to pay rents, that isn't a collection effort if he is current asking about the future  Ask his attorney first.

I have a couple of friends that also do flips and they feel the rehab for this house is too extensive and therefore not worth the effort.

Did you think that putting him down and virtually laughing at his efforts would somehow motivate him to pay your $200-$250/hr fee to attain the benefit of your great wisdom?  

How much time & efforts you will need to invest in this property and how much value will it deliver in return. 

Can anyone out there point me to a step-by-step guide to setting up a direct mail marketing effort?

It takes a lot of effort to get fuel oil burning.

Why not add an administrative fee into the new agreement to cover your time and effort in trying to accommodate?

You need a large enough spread to cover unforeseen occurrences and expenses and enough to have a profit worth the time, effort, and most important, the risk you take.As far as scaling your business, don’t scale what you have started.

I'm presuming it's in an effort to have built in equity from the start.

That avoids the situation where your money person hamstrings your efforts to get the most money for the property.