Bill was asking me about the rental house, so I figured that I give you folks an update as well.
The house turned out to be a disaster. The remodel was finished when we moved in on 6/15, but the landlord had not gotten the final inspection so the natural gas was not connected. Power was being supplied to the house by a high-voltage cable from another house on the property, which is clearly not acceptable as a semi-permanent solution.
There were also a number of other minor things wrong with the house. When I presented the list of issues to the landlord, he became fairly upset with my supposed "nitpicking" and basically kicked me out. He did give me back 100% of the money back, but having to find a new place within one week was no fun.
Due to the time crunch I did go after the landlord, but I really should have. After moving out of the house, I moved into a somewhat upscale apartment complex that my new workplace has done some collaboration with in the past. This apartment complex gave me a decent move-in incentive and accommodated me on a short schedule, so I am quite grateful for that.
Lesson learned? If it's too cheap and seems too good to be true, it probably is.