I don't recommend buying in the same market over the course of a number of years because market fundamentals are constantly changing, but you certainly can for a while.

Welcome back while the market might have changed the same fundamentals are still important.

While I was/am not an inspector, I have good mechanical skills and construction fundamentals, so the walk thru was sufficient. 

Properties can be purchased with cash, or financed many different ways but the operating fundamentals remain unchanged.  

Unfortunately the secret is that what you are doing doesn't work, not because you aren't doing it well but because it is a fundamentally flawed approach.  

By beginning to look at deals that fundamentally meet your criteria 

Helping people and being a positive influence in the community makes me feel happy at a fundamental and primal level.  

A majority of all those RE acquisitions were closed without basic RE fundamentals as part of the deal causing them to play a major part in the housing crisis as they were not structured properly and/or in fragile portfolios that quickly crumbled with the first sign of trouble.Flash forward 10 years to 2016, minus the banking industry’s participation, we are seeing the same industry practices that played a major role in the last bubble.

I did not start similarly to you but I think fundamentally if you find a good deal and have done your networking properly, multiple doors will open for you.

I can say that I feel pretty comfortable and have a solid understanding of the fundamentals.