By buying mortgages, Fannie and Freddie reduce risk for lenders.

If you go this route, make sure the numbers work after factoring in carrying costs. 

Borrowing against securities is a high risk proposition.

That may impact the amount you have listedYour most advantageous route for financing will be seller carry or finding a private lender.

Build - rent - refinance -repeat. in columbus ohio you are buying old houses that are 1900 or 1920 or 1940 and you are in a sellers market. on the other hand you can source land which is a buyers market and build single family homes or duplex or triplexes that will return by renting and pulling cash out on a DSCR loan and doing it again. there aren't a lot of strategies that do this. flipping is different. so many risks. but when someone has a well oiled machine it's all good and less risk.

Run your business as a business or risk it.  

Cross-Collateralization – A lender may finance the full $160,000 purchase by using your existing properties as additional security, lowering their risk and possibly reducing your down payment. 5.

We are considering taking a 2-5 year risk of owning the home to collect on appreciation since prices are stagnant right now, and pray fire doesn’t take it.

-The mention of syndication being less risky than HML...I'd suggest it is more risk, possibly much much more since you don't know whether you are good or bad at vetting the operator right now.

Simply put, we start off with the As Repaired/Completed Value (ARV), then subtract from that number a reasonable profit, the rehab cost (scope of work), which we've gotten good at, a contingency reserve for any "unexpecteds", our cost of capital/carrying costs (interest and costs of the leverage used), and our costs/fees on the buy and sell sides of a flip.