You do your best to keep us newbies on track, and I greatly appreciate you.My offer on the short sale still hasn't been responded to, but following suggestions on other threads here, I called the city permitting section and found out that IF the extra room (if it IS an extra--not original) room is not permitted, it will cost about $300 to get "after-construction" permits for it.

Put a number in his head and let it fester.If the rehab you have is permitted, pull down permits or lack thereof for the comps and use that as leverage.

Your business may not be an indicator of RE at all, how much growth your area has is a better indicator, new housing starts, building permits is a good indicator of the market.

I haven't even closed on my first deal yet but am 8k in the hole getting my first marketing pieces together, web sites built, domain names purchased, call center set up, postal permit, printers, vanity number rented, bandit signs purchased, etc, etc. 

They are a gestapo and require ridiculous inspections and permits.

If it's on the neighbor's property that was just developed, I would suggest calling the permit/inspections office in your jurisdiction and telling them that a builder just built on the property next door and you're concerned there is an unsafe retaining wall on the property -- can they have an inspector take a look?

They required permits on the back end that weren't specified on the front end, and the even required that I contribute additional funds to the contingency after we closed.

Without running formal numbers, I'm going to say it looks like this: Land purchase: $40k Permits, plans, etc: $8k Construction costs: $190k Potential rental income: $900-1000/month or average $675/month vacation rental (est) Are there any ways to finance this that I'm not aware of?

Custodians are permitted to custody assets held in an IRA under IRC Section 408.

Then you need reserves above that.3.5 Three residential units and stating that the office are would be used by you may be doable as a tri-plex in conventional financing, you need to check zoning and may need to forego any use permit.