Dealing with Wholesalers

[Mark Gilford]

I am looking to get into REI and met with a local wholesaling group. I met with the local agent and spoke with the one of the owners. They contacted me about a house in West Houston that just came under contract with them. They sent me their estimations on rehab and ARV and said if I was interested to show up the next day. Five people showed up to the house with the tenant still inside and had a chance to look around and if we wanted to purchase we had to pick a card from a deck of cards and high card wins. We overheard the tenant telling someone that the water wasn't working. We weren't sure if this was because of delinquent bills or something wrong. We ended up drawing high card and they said we had until that night to make a decision. The house needed a ton of mainly aesthetic work and a new roof. The tenant ran this house into the ground and smoked heavily inside but they said he would be gone by closing. They said I could not have an inspection done before signing a contract. They said this is how most of their deals are conducted.

My question is if this is how wholesalers normally operate (Quick decision to sign a contract, no inspection, couldn't answer if bad plumbing, was tenant really leaving?) 

For my first house I felt like this was very rushed and we didn't have a chance to do our due diligence. We ultimately decided to decline signing the contract.