When should I get a Real Estate Agent?

[David Donald Henning Jr.]

I'm new to real estate investing and don't plan on actually buying for about another 8-10 months. I'm in the research stage, trying to gain as much knowledge as humanly possible before I jump in, and I've been using Realtor.com and other like sources to find deals I can practice analyzing. It would be great to have automatic leads coming in so that I can become more familiar with my market, have access to more deals, etc... but the last thing I would want to do is waste an agent's time. When do you recommend actually getting a real estate agent?