He is well-versed on this topic, and is a big advocate of the infinite banking concept.

A good way for deal to blow up.....what happens to the original seller when someone stops making the payments?

Some advocates say there are closer to 20,000 in Seattle.  

He use to preach Direct Mail (postcards,etc), but had another person (most likely a partnership of sorts) that was advocating calling and emails to start as it is much cheaper.

I'm not trying to be argumentative here, just playing devils advocate.

We had a 15M dollar loan blow up with Fannie the night before closing.

Factoring in a realistic tax on top of that blows whole life out of the water. 

Make a low barrier for entry and then blow away your competition with quality of product.  

You can update fixtures, kitchen counter top and such, but don't blow out walls, especially being new, that can get you over your head real quick, you have no idea what might be inside those walls, you get into EPA stuff and you'll cry and go broke on it.

Apologies for  jumping to the conclusion you were advocating Midwest.