I went through a 750,000 openhouse with sold/pending sign that had a 100 foot 32000 volt high tension tower so close I could hit it with a baseball (in my youth).

I will have a chance to exercise my creative deal-making muscles early that will hopefully serve me well in the future.  

Their muscles get stronger.

Typically reno scope/rents/insurance/etc. are very market-specific, so building your analysis muscle for your chosen market is important so that you go in with the best possible chance to make an educated choice on purchasing.

This is just for practice for now so the most important thing is just looking at the numbers to gain an understanding, don't put too much pressure on it at this point, it's a muscle you have to build by doing reps. 2.

Every call I made to the lender seemed to escalate the tension.

Your muscles will be sore every day, you will see people doing much better than you, and you will constantly fail.

I understand the tension of customers not wanting to constantly give everything up front for fear of the contractor having no incentive to work quickly, and even worse the possibility of them running off with the cash...but in the same breath the contractor wants to be certain that the customer is in fact going to pay, and pay in a timely manner.

So for me in majority part I am just scratching an itch, and I am exercising a muscle. 

As Brandon Turner, one of the BP OG's advises, evaluate at least 10 properties per week to see if they are worth investing in/flipping/whatever your focus is because this builds your "investor muscles" so you will know a good deal when it comes up.