This issue has actually evolved into one of the best milestones in my real estate career so far: I found and hired an excellent property manager!

If you are rehabbing then presuming the draws are in arrears at each milestone then you need money for at least the first rehab milestone.

For larger projects, I've broken the scope into milestones and awarded bonuses at those points.

Instead of trying for a home run right from the start (i.e. turnkey investment company promising all sorts of things), try starting with buying one property and seeing if you can generate the ROI and hit all the milestones/deliverables you have defined.

So you can see what you have or what you are dealing with at each milestone.

@Markia Dunn To stay focused, keep a task list interdispersed with reasonable milestones.

But lets say you get a great purchase, sky high LTV (let's ignore why you are also selling so cheap) and some nice HML such as ourselves will lend you 90% of cost plus 100% of rehab... say at a generous 10% interest only plus a mere 2 points.So at least a 10% downpayment plus $30k reno is a total loan size of $300k.You will need that cash on hand for the downpayment ($30k), for loan closing costs (2 points that's $6k plus loan fees plus Title plus Appraisal let's round to say $10k total), for funding till the first rehab milestone/draw ($5k?)

They typically don't look at your income or tax returns but will often vary what they can lend you depending on your experience flipping/rehabbing and your credit score.Many HMLs will have a minimum loan size, say $75K or $150K.HMLs will also usually still require you to have skin in the game, funding perhaps 90% of purchase or 75% of As-Is value whichever is less, plus 100% of rehab in arrears draws.Besides the down-payments you you also need capital for closing costs, Appraisal, rehab (if any) till the first draw milestone and of course for servicing the loan at least until you have flipped or stabilized. 

After the initial payment, agree to pay at certain milestones of completion after your inspection.

.- rehab money until at least the first milestone since our draws are paid in arrears. - money for cost and time over-runs of the above.