There are lenders out there spending a ton on advertising with an army of correspondent's funneling them loans and many can very well be one and done borrowers because the loan servicing/construction admin is lousy. 

Spend time reading the forum.

I thought I was overcharged for my rehabs, especially because I didn’t have a solid process for oversight in place initially.I ended up having my property manager oversee the rehab projects, which helped but came at an extra cost—around 10% of the total rehab budget.

I'm going off the understanding that you still need to spend 500+ hours in the business to achieve material participation (please correct me if I'm wrong). 

IMO, the best strategy for that type of individual is to purchase residential property in an area they are or can become familiar with; in an area where the neighborhood is “on the rise”, typically where demand exceeds supply and people are spending $$$ on fixing up properties.  

Any HML will want answers to those questions plus a rehab budget before getting you a term sheet for a fix n flip loan for this property.I close these types of loans all the time, if you have any specific questions about the process don't hesitate to reach out.

Insurance doesn't cover anything anymore and we can almost just pay for all damages with the money we spend on it! 

I think having a balanced budget would be ideal where you allocate money into buying another property and money set aside for renovations.

People listing a budget of 50k, 100k, 200k in NJ (never will happen).

Start with your budget then think about location.This is a really vague question.