We sold our house about a year ago and are currently sitting on the sidelines in a rental.
I'd have to have some pretty serious concessions from the owners if they wanted me to make the house available at a moments notice, always have it "show ready" etc. all the while knowing the goal was to sell it out from under me.
We had an incentive to do those things as owners... as renters, not so much.
Interesting note:
The owners of the house we're in now tried to sell first, but decided to rent it out because they felt the offers were too low (even though I know one of them was for almost 3x what they paid less than 10 years ago)
Then the first folks who rented it decided they were ready to buy, so about 6 months into their 1 year lease they made an offer on the place. But since prices had declined, it was for less than the owners had been offered before. They said no, so the renters promptly broke their lease and bought something else.
A few months after we moved in there were some major problems discovered that are going to cost a huge chunk of change to fix. The owners asked if we were interested in buying the place and offered it to us for significantly less than the previous offers they had received.
I imagine in their minds it was quite the deal and I understand they were shocked when we said no thanks. But why in the world would we want to pay more than we're paying in rent to own a place that is located in a declining market and that we know needs major work?
I'm thinking the rent it out and wait for the market to turn around thing isn't working out too well for our owners.