Not necessarily in an academic sense, but you can see their intelligence when you chat with them.

The competition is capitalized, experienced, and intelligent.  

My impression is that he's an adaptive operator who moves with stealth techniques, gathers intelligence on the situation of the mission, then resolves the matter with overwhelming tactical assets and firepower to complete the mission.

Not to offend anyone's intelligence, but for those of you with iDevices that are behind the curve:1.

About the property, it's a home that has been converted to 8 units in a desirable area of Miami Beach, FL -- it neighbors a few other multi-family buildings as well as million dollar homes -- golf course and private island nearby -- when I say it landed in my lap I mean it belongs to a close friend of my family who does not want to list it and needs cash -- yes, there is still a small amount on the loan and the property has about 40% equity (I need to verify that number though) -- properties in the area range in value from $850K to $2.5M, although there are outliers -- from what I've been learning, my next step is to get it under contract -- what information should I ask for in order to do this intelligently?

I believe the home prices in Philly are artificially inflated right now because of said competition. 

The returns in my 2nd Scenario with a 20% down payment and 80% LTV is just about what I normally do and the Appreciation Rates is a little bit higher than what you achieved from 2007 to today.An example would be a property I bought in Clinton Hill Brooklyn in 2004 for $890k is now worth $3 Million today.A second example is a property I bought in Bed-Stuy Brooklyn in 2014 for $900k, renovations of $375k, now worth over $2 Million.I've done this 8 times consecutively and by intelligent decision making.I think that you can look at certain up and coming neighborhoods in NYC that are primed for future appreciation where you can still buy in should you decide to house hack it.I included David Foster in this posting because I think one of your option is to do a 1031 exchange into another property if you feel your area is currently peaking.

How do you make an intelligent offer if you don't see the property.

Full disclosure my degree is in Law Enforcement Intelligence Studies, it is 100% useless for what I do. 

I'll let someone with more time and intelligence talk the numbers with you.