Step 1: Ensure you can get financing (is it a cash purchase or will you need a loan). 

Understanding the true material costs is important and I urge investors to get a good grasp of this before agreeing to labor only bids where they are responsible for purchasing materials.  

I've found an off-market property that would require $175k purchase, $35k down, $20k in repairs, with a conservative ARV of $235k. 

Purchase price: $110,000 Cash invested: $30,000 Hobby Farm On 10 acres2300 sq ft house with 8 out buildings - Large Barn, Animal/hog barn, Mid-size machine shed (2) 25' x 35' / 30' x 50', Large Machine shed 60' x 60', Grainery barn, Entertainment Barn, 3 car garage What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

For a purchase generally application would be to review an ID, asset statements, and LLC docs if neccesary. 

Or buy something that needs some love and some hard money lenders will fund up to 90-100% of the purchase and rehab.

So if you purchased one 4-plex each year, after 10 years you would have about $12K per month in cash flow.

Have you considered using a down payment assistance (DPA) loan/grant for this purchase?

So pretty good equity position within a year plus cash flowing well based on a $325k purchase price.

He negotiated a $5k discount on the purchase price, and I moved forward with the deal.Fast forward to now - after seeing water in the basement, I hired a professional to inspect it, and the news was not great.