Its always a gamble but the flood variable adds risk that is hard to quantify up front.

You’re essentially gambling.

it depends on your risk tolerance but that is a gamble I would be willing to take.

I can't get anyone to say they have, let alone authenticate it.

Flipping is a gamble and takes a lot of hard work and knowledge.

It is a gamble.

It feels like slightly informed gambling. 

issue you have is on a site like this  the majority opinion is cash flow is everything and anything else appreciation etc is gambling.. 

So we had to take a gamble and accept the house without knowing if the furnace worked.

We tend to forget often how key that can be....we often like to fake it until we make it but I think we often sometimes miss genuine opportunities by being genuine and owning our situation...there's something special about authenticity @Joshua HowaniecYes I am definitely a big fan of Grant Cardone, he's cold calling section on Grant Cardone University alone is more than a great foundaiton on how to speak to human beings....we have them watch that in addition to role playing (be hard on them so they can expect the worse and help them with objections as learning points....as Grant says the same objections are going to come up, if you do it long enough, if you can train them to identify those and learn from them and prepare on what to say next, they won't have any troubles....remember it's properties that we're talking about....there can only be so many objections...it's not as difficult as it may seem.