Not sure how many have had issues similar to mine, but I was unable to get Essentials (standalone Open Source version) to installer using the version that is listed on the Essentials download page.

The way I resolved this is by uninstalling the solution and installing it using the Git repository (also executable install, but must have something slightly different about it.
For anyone that is having this issue, the git hub located here, fixed the issue:
https://github.com/essentialproject
Greg