(partially because I'd love to own in Venice and it's super irritating I can't...)

If you're putting up 100% of the capital and they have no skin in the game that's a red flag to me.

Most of the time you end up stroking big checks and wait and lose control and have to go back and fix it anyway.No way I'd wait on somebody (who has no skin in this and doesn't really give a rip) to do this for me while taking forever and getting a month of rent for the privilege.

Then you technically have nothing to lose and the banks wants to still see you have skin in the game.

It's certainly more likely that you'll get a response than a yellow letter, but I bet you'll need some thick skin for the responses you'll get.  

Your ROI is a number close to infinity and you can repeat indefinitely - And YES - there are still deals out there that will work ... one just closed a couple of weeks ago in The Woodlands on MLS at about 70% of value and only needed light rehab - maybe $5,000-$6,000ARV - 177,000Sold - 123,000Rehab - $5,000Total invested - $128,000-$129,00080% refi - $141,000 Rents - $1,500-$1,600 My initial offer was $120,000 - They declined to counter - Now that I see the final sale amount, it irritates me that I was so close but missed the deal  

My experience: you need skin for this game.

I know it gets under people's skin to think they are paying for their tenants to go hog wild on heating and cooling, but in this area it seems fairly common for utilities to be linked together in a lot of properties I have seen.

I can tell you that I would never invest in a deal unless the lead investor had significant skin in the game.

If someone could point me to some beginners reading materials, and possibly recommend a strategy to get some skin in the game (i.e. how to get a JV money partner) I would be very grateful!