They are very different.If you had all the resources at your disposal -- money, a deal, adequate time -- and you could not get off the starting line because you kept wanting to have one more piece of information to move your certainty from 99.99% to 100%, then you would have analysis paralysis.What you are doing now is preparation.  

We have our accountants, lawyers, and title agents at our disposal.  

When they were not rented it was not fun.Personally, flipping condos I would discourage from as it is simpler to flip single family homes as your buyer demographic will have a higher disposable income.

Remember, sometimes it is a lot easier to get into a property than to dispose of it.

My new BP buddy is going to meet me for the first time at my unit next door to this and I barter installing a disposal for him serving my tenant.

I think I can do better than my current (stock) investments, but more importantly, I'll be leveraging a potential pot of money that I didn't realize until lately that I had at my disposal.

Here's a quick summary of what you need based on my approach (others may do it differently): Identify a market that you want to wholesale inFind and/or buy a list of high-equity homeownersSend out yellow letters to the list with a phone number that goes to voicemailWait for calls to come into your voicemailReturn the calls, identify motivation, gather intelligence (address, motivation, asking price, etc)For properties that meet your criteria, make an offer using this formula (ARV * 70% - Rehab Costs - Wholesale Fee)Get a signed accepted offerHaving someone on the ground visually inspect the property, negotiate price again if the rehab is greater than you expectEither open escrow and buy the house and then dispose of it a number of ways or find a cash buyer and assign it to them.That's essentially what I'm doing in a nutshell.

Tenant agrees to properly dispose of allplant debris and agrees to not leave such on the property.f.     

So even if you deducted the $20k, you may not be able to deduct it against your ordinary income as it would just be a loss that is carried forward until used or the property is disposed. 

Mike, there is a difference between an equity funded loan and a cash loan, equity loans are installment contracts, even if the title is past, the title is subject to paying as agreed, if the note is not paid, as you can see in the UCC, the transaction is not completed at title to financed assets reverts back to the seller, the title reverts back with the seller's original title interests owning the property.There are lien states and title states as to collateral that may be conveyed, a lien only conveys a lien interest not ownership rights, securing collateral is not ownership and the collateral must be sold with proceeds first applied to the cost of sale, then costs incurred such as safekeeping of the collateral, then to the obligation  and any excess is owed to the owner-borrower, this has nothing to do with redemption rights to meet the obligation within a time frame.Title states convey title to collateral, taking back collateral puts that lender in title and they may dispose of the property, the owner may be out any equity, but then comes "courts of equity" as to what might be fair as far as indemnifying the lender and then what would be a windfall profit to a lender, being a lender is not buying the RE and being in the RE business.