Hung out with people my age because they were fun to hang out with, not older mentors because I admired and wanted to become more like them.

I admire your bpnatural curiosity. 

I'm still in the learning phase and my approach has been to hear out the opinions and strategies of a lot of different people who came from different areas/backgrounds -- no matter how much I REALLY like/admire somebody, I never want to start drinking too much koolaid from one person :)

It will be a great lesson for all in the room for what NOT to do.BTW, even though your plan to pay off your HELOC is for 10 years and that is an admirable goal (I doubt seriously the majority of the money to do that will come from the property because I think you've analyzed this far from realistically), for long term holds with our historically low interest rates I recommend fixed rate, term loans which would completely eliminate the risk of interest rates rising and cutting this already very thin (probably in-the-red) deal off at the knees. 

Mortgage rates have done an admiral job of staving off the pain of ever increasing house prices, but they can only go so far, and they already are at record lows.Without an economic collapse, I don't see house prices reversing trend.Higher rates will likely slow the economy, but not collapse it.I've always thought that the purchasing power was the key metric when considering to buy or not.

That includes trenching for electrical lines, skim coating drywall, landscaping, and - yes - due diligence on new purchases.I don't know if that's a "mentor" or not, but I admire folks who roll up their sleeves and dive in.

The successful house flippers that I admire typically start their projects with the landscape.

They might even admire you! 

Any deal can be done and I admire your 50/50 out of the gate style.

Thank you all for participating.Mike (whose opinion I admire, as I do you all) wrote:Caitlin, you probably aren't going to like this answer, but if you have to ask questions like this, I don't believe that you're even close to being ready for a $3 Million Dollar Deal.