Financial Transparency:Managing the budget yourself allows for greater transparency in costs, helping you to identify where money is being spent and find opportunities for savings.It's important to consider the potential downsides, such as the significant time commitment, the need for substantial construction knowledge and experience, the risk of costly mistakes, and the responsibility for managing permits, inspections, and compliance with building codes.

If you're planning to invest less than $400-500k USD, the properties you could find within that budget will not stand out in the market, and you'll face high competition in the STR (Short-Term Rental) market.

Also, I lack familiarity with the construction loan process and what protections that may be in place (if any) to prevent FIG and their builders from going over budget on the project. 

I'd like to put together a budget for development.

@Nicholas A.It is easy to underestimate your rehab budget. - make sure to get bids from multiple contractors and have adequate reserves.It is easy to overestimate your ARV. - Have an agent pull recent comps for youIt is easy to underestimate the timeline. - whatever a contractor says, add 4 weeks.

That allows renovations with quite small budgets.

How much was total budget?

To be sustainably successful requires a marketing budget of $5,000 - $10,000 per month PER market area.  

You're totally right about Denver's appreciation—it's been impressive, but it's also driven up property values, making it tough to find good rental yields, especially with a $600k budget.

You need a budget and should give every dollar a purpose.