As many other newbies attempting to flip a house, I have a ton of questions like where to buy, how to figure ARV, where and what to look for, and how to start.

Having a general working knowledge of the area you want to invest in is usually step one.I'm relatively new to investing as well (working on acquiring my 4th unit now) - I'm in the Chicago area and in general I know that returns in the Midwest can be higher than in coastal areas, so you have that going for you; but every neighborhood has it's own oddities and character.

@Dan Leyden-I made an attempt to a few days back to send you a message, it may not have gone through with my newbie BP navigational skills.  

You need to learn real estate before attempting to understand real estate financing or deal making.

Just because they will be putting tenants in the units does not mean that they will be the sort of good tenant that is desirable; chances are good that since they have no intention of ongoing management of the building, that they aren't going to go through the added effort of screening tenants to be certain they will be tenants with good character.  

The last step in your screening process, should include a phone call or meeting to assess the character of your tenant and whether you feel they will be easy to work with or highly demanding and a pain in the ***. 

This is where I struggle because after a few attempts so far I have been unable to remotely convince the seller of this being in their favor or being a good idea.

It will be critical to try and pass your test on 1st attempt because the certificate will the be good for 6 years verses 3.IMPORTANT,,,all certificates expire at deed transfer and the new owner has NO GUARATEE of future passing.

Matt Motil , I was doing some thinking about this as I was attempting to fall asleep.

(Also if you want to tag people just type @ followed by first 3 characters of their name and you will see the people pop up below, just click on it)