I hope that this community embraces me and can teach me the inroads to this brave new world.

I personally embrace this newbie journey!

If you want to make it as a house flipper you're going to need to embrace initiative, hard work, and hustle.That begins now.

Since concrete is porous and water vapor can penetrate, vapor barriers may be desired under the floor.My house had an old garage transformed into part of the house and the skids were on tar. 

It' supposed to fill the pores of the concrete and help prevent moisture from penetrating all the way through from the soil into your space.UGL Dry-Lok is one such product.

For most people this is a geographic area near where they live and the easiest to penetrate because you are constantly passing other houses on your way home and know people in your neighborhood.  

But before that and if the floors have a decent finish (so the cat urine is not absorbed and penetrated) you might try cleaning/sealing the walls and other porous surfaces first. 

Embrace those struggles and don’t ask why, but ask what can I learn from these impediments.

Some guys do a basic magnetometer scan (detects metal) and others can do more comprehensive ground penetrating radar (GPR).  

No one solution is right for everyone... try try again... embrace fear (false evidence appearing real or fail early and recover).