Cleanup process and how to best get the smell out of the house?

Start buying warranties so you don't have To deal with the headache. add 0.5% to the purchase price, make it part of your sales process. hedges and shifts the risk. you can get 10 year builder policies underwritten and approved. that's how we do it. anything we can do to lower the risk for ourselves is ideal.

We don’t mind the recording process—at the very least it’s a tax write off—but let me throw a few more angles out there that I hadn’t mentioned before and see what you and @Chris Seveney think: the CFD’s we’re purchasing are for unimproved land parcels, so I don’t think there’s an obligation to insure.

I just want to hear it.As well as that, I want to ask what you could have done to prevent it one, or any red flags you saw during the screening process or before it happened, that should have made you act earlier. 

You are going to get a trespass call because you don't know what you are doing.How were you planning on doing this if you don't know how to calculate the value of a home?

So excited to have my first property and I plan to hold for the long term.

Do you plan on self-managing (you should)?

if you plan to use it as a 2nd home as well as lease it out, conventional loan will allow you to just put 10% down. 

We secured a comprehensive plan for renovations, including a quote for necessary foundation repairs.

If you plan on being a buy and hold investor then you should be prepared to handle capex events on all of your properties.