It is a gamble. 

In fact, you can purchase a property from a wholesaler with a realtor, you just have to provide their fee in most cases.Once you are familiar with figuring out each of the "givens" in the equation above you will be ready to make an informed offer, until then your are gambling and not investing.

Originally posted by @Luke Spooner:@Bradley Sriro the other option is wait for another year and continue to save, observing the fall out from the Corona Virus and see what potential deals come up.....Waiting is always an option but it's a bit of a gamble because you have to hope that your savings rate keeps pace with the appreciation in South Florida.

I took a big gamble and could have gotten my bouté handed to me, but I got relatively lucky.

For instance  Cash flow is the ONLY thing appreciation is gambling.. that's crazy talk its not that cut and dry.. appreciation either organic or forced is how the millions are made in real estate its not made at 100 to 200 a month.. its made by the values going up..  

Originally, we figured we would gamble since there was no inspection and thought worst case scenario would be around $8,000 to replace it.

Appreciation is a gamble, nobody can predicts clearly where prices will go and when.

@Richard Xyminies it’s a gamble and I guess it depends where - units aren’t always cheap lol.

Any of this is a gamble.

That's always a gamble though and new construction rarely works for rentals.