Better yet use a lender that gets you fully underwritten up front, so you don't run into any surprises.#2 Keep an eye on interest rates based on what the loan officers proposes. 

Jared, you might be surprised what you can do with an FHA loan.

This is a new venture for him so I'm not super surprised at the lack of feedback out there. 

Also, any advice for avoiding those unexpected surprises (or at least making them less painful) would be super appreciated.

I would be very surprised if they are just keeping your money.

This surprise turned this amazing deal into something like a okay deal because the lot was still good.

I plan to shop around more but I’m surprised that there aren’t more funding options in California with the recent popularity of ADUs help with the leverage component. 

I am comparing both of them right now and while people seem to prefer Propstream, I am surprised to see how many comps do not come up in the search, while Batchleads and even Zillow give me more results (using the exact same filters).

Surprisingly, for some of the complexes the market valuations slipped to under 50% and therefore those properties were underwater, even with "only" 50% debt. 

But I'm surprise it was found dead.