Newbie from Denver

[Krish Das]

Interested in real estate and become the member of BP. Great website with lots of content and people. Denver market is really hot and it looks more like a sellers market. I am trying to buy a rental (my first buy) and want to get some positive cash flow out of it. I was following few of the rental sites, talked to an agent and started following few rentals for sale. Most of them which I cherry picked, were gone within a day or 2. Above all, all of them were going at 15-20% over listing price. I know it is the real estate market and may be those properties are not worth that much. I ended up competing with cash buyers and I started over bidding.  I am not a cash buyer and with my first buy, I don't want to take too much of risk.  I am aiming to put 25-30% down (as it goes with investment property).

Looking for gurus out here who deals with same situation and how they handle it and how much risk they take. Looking for strategies on how to make money with condos if I start now in Denver (and surroundings) market.