How do I set a price 24 months out on a house that's sat 70 days?

Take your numbers apart before you pick a price.

$1,750 against $1,340 carry is $410 a month, $9,840 over 24 months, plus $5,000 today. If you credit $250 a month, that's $6,000 of credit plus the $5,000 fee, so $11,000 comes off at closing. Strike at $214,000 nets you $203,000. You're all-in at $186,000, so $17,000 plus the $9,840 of positive carry, minus whatever you spend on repairs, over two years. On $186,000 that's roughly 7% a year without financing costs beyond what's in your carry. That's the deal you'd actually be signing.

Now the version where they don't buy. You keep $5,000, you keep the $6,000 that was only ever a credit, you collected $410 a month, and you own the house. So your downside branch is fine. That's what makes this different from a flip and it's why the strike price matters less than you think.

What I'd want to know: how confident are you in the $1,340 carry number holding for 24 months, and does it include taxes reassessing after your purchase? In a lot of counties the assessment resets and your carry moves. Check with your county assessor's office rather than assuming.

@ember has that right, and it's the answer to flint's question in a way. How a default gets handled when the occupant holds an option depends on your state and on how the documents are written, and in some states a court can look at heavy rent credits and a long option and treat the arrangement as something other than a straight lease, which changes the process entirely. That's a question for an attorney licensed where the house is, before signing, not after.

The practical piece from the management side: keep the option to purchase as a separate contract from the lease. Two documents. It's what people who do these regularly do, and it's the difference between a rent dispute and an argument about whether they own the house.

On the credit, $250 of $1,750 is normal enough and it gives them something real without gutting your proceeds. Do a signed condition report with photos at move-in and name who pays for the water heater and the furnace by dollar amount, because tenant-buyers behave like owners on the fun repairs and like tenants on the expensive ones. And build in an extension clause with a fee. Month 22 with the collection still not cleared is the most likely way this goes, and you want a paid extension in the document instead of a negotiation.