Aaron I believe his work is expensive primarily b/c his skilled labor costs are high, not because he's making a fat margin.  

Finding buyers is the least of your worries (Just go to every REI meeting you can in our area & you will have a list in no time), the key is finding MOTIVATED SELLERS.

Then find the best mentor you can in that kind of investing.

Wholesalers outright lie about ARVsRealtors will inflate the values to try and get listings...If you expect to use a wholesaler to source deals (they typically take the fat off most deals) and a realtor to verify the ARVs expect to do a few flips for free or at a loss.Don't get me wrong, good realtors and wholesalers are out there.....just like unicorns.

But even with me asking the agent to move the needle of risk as far as she can in my direction, its still pricing the property out of sight.

So my point is use both of them; save as much as you can in a ROTH 401K, invest in funds with the lowest annual fees, and when you switch jobs move the money to a self directed account and invest in notes. 

Then one day, in place of my beautiful plants was a very fat and satisfied green horn worm.

If I have a non-animal friendly property, I let all applicants know I have documentation from the city that housing any canine at all would be an unreasonable burden (some of mine are upstairs, down the hallway-type apts) to keep them from suddenly getting a doctor's note.  

Remember to set up your keywords and connect with as many local investors as you can in person.

Now my life is "ruined" :) As of writing this post, my Real Estate investing experience is a big fat 0.