If you are a real estate professional and more specifically, if the income generated from selling this property would be classified as ordinary income you would have a completely different treatment.

Then 10-15 days later the mother and father went in and started seeking medical treatment for carbon monoxide poisoning.

@Rachael Britton You do not need a realtor to submit an offer for a property, but if you are dealing with the Seller's Agent directly, understand that unless/until their status changes to Transaction Broker, they will continue to be the Seller's Agent, meaning they are only working in the Seller's best interest and owe you basically nothing besides fair and honest treatment.

You also will likely want to understand the costs included in purchasing and renovating that either get capitalized or deducted or no treatment.

In order to have long-term capital gains treatment, outside of inheritance situations, you must have owned the property for at least 1 year. 

In this case, the chicken came first.And you're right about how a good full time agent will eat your lunch, but hopefully within the bounds of ethics and good taste.As a full time (and then some) agent, I'll remind sellers that most part timers tend to treat this profession as a hobby, hoping that while they hold down another full time job, that they'll trip over a couple of deals each year.  

I believe with the design and work ethic my husband and I have that we can bring a quality home that will be all new and relatively spending about the same out of pocket to build new as I was spending on flipping a house that was built in 1962.

., Without documentation that the property has been held for investment it would not qualify for 1031 treatment. 

Knowing financing options, inventory, pricing, construction costs and how to run an ethical business in paramount. 

There's no discount for not having your own agent.If you deal directly with the listing agent, you are up against someone who is bound by ethics and law to represent the best interests of the seller.