If the bids aren't where you want to be, go back #4 and iterate on the design You could easily spend a few thousand dollars (or more) to get to the point where you'll have a plan and firm bids in place so you can decide if you want to move forward.

Its for these reasons we work with the smaller and more agile brokers (and banks) that focus on customer service, repeat business, and logic and understanding of the deal.

But at each iteration, you'll be learning a lot of what you'll need to know.I started making my plan a year to 18 months before we bought our first property.

Thanks Kevin for a great post, as someone that is just starting out on this exciting path, it was very helpful and it once again re-iterates the advice I'm getting in J Scott's book as well. 

It is impractical to think you will understand all of the risks and iterations that come with the many loan attributes.

This recession is the first time the new iteration of the "crowd sourced" syndication model will truly be tested in a down cycle.

If it is too large you may have to have multiple iterations to meet varying codes/zoning).

I also re-iterate it throughout our process. 

Examples of what I mean are:  in the late '40s and early '50s a "heavy wall" became a common iteration on a pier-and-beam foundation. 

I Appreciate it. @Eric