That's the money world.

My realtor seems confident that I can get in with zero money down.

Which would be to borrow the money to fund 1-3 residential flips, in order to pay back the loan and then have more capital to then actually build on the land starting early spring of next year. 

Save money for the down payment. 

What is the standard option and earnest money in your area?  

At least you'll probably get most of your money back when the deal gets refinanced or sold.

Let us say you want to have a Section 8 rental, then first try to define what you can afford and where is that money will come from.

This is our first investment together so we're exploring financing options.Wondering if anyone has trusted contacts in private lending/hard money who are able to fund ~$400k in acquisition cost and ~$250-300k in repairs?

So if you can do just a few deals a year you can be making some extra money, learning, and establishing yourself so that eventually you can easily transition into being full time.

At the same time, I have decent money in my IRA  invested in mutual funds.