The house is also furnished with a solid wood no spring couch, and a solid wood round dining table, and a king sized bedroom set in the master.

The key rules are as follows:1) Syndicator MUST have significant skin in the game, including 10% of the money raised in the first deal, 8% of the second, and 3% of the third2) The only fees allowed are 5% of revenue for property / asset management, which is enough to put food on the table, but not incentivize people to just buy, buy, buy3) The only compensation is 20% of the profit (less on the first 2 deals)4) Rapid acquisition is not allowed. 5% Is minus all operating cost correct ? 

Like you said in your post, "Buying and holding is a long term strategy...............focus on the end goal"The second reason for trying to get good deals is that if you can get a 10-20% built in equity off the bat, it has the advantage of:- taking a big part of the risk factor off the table- built in equity that can be utilized as required- better cash flowThere are a lot of people on BPs that say that "money is made on the front end in RE".

So as an example, if the hose sells for 90% of market value then it is doubtful you will get an added 20% on the table with your discount.

Shall we get a table for dinner or just go to a bar? 

No sure if the HML who was selling him the paper / and I dont know in your deal if you table funded that and they bought the loan 3 days later..

No, meaning that if you had professional support it's likely they helped you set the table for later.This much structure with five properties can be overload and proper planning.

Cheap rates and modern tech are great, but none of that matters if they can't actually get you to the closing table.

And I don't think it was a very serious offer, it came up in a conversation about selling my team, which is absolutely not on the table. 

The downside of that is I am leaving money on the table.