One of the things I'm coming up again is the insane amount of competition for deals.

Right now the market is healthy and I can tell you that there is pretty strong competition for any type of distressed property.

I purchase their raw data by zipcode(s) to analyze historical/competitive properties and massage it into the critical details I am looking for (need some basic excel skills).  

Just a word of caution - if you have any competition at all on this purchase be careful not to divulge info here that could be used against you in the transaction until you actually own the property.

Offer a competitive commission for your area.

I recently found a flip so I brought in one of my investors and a mutual friend of ours to show the ropes but we all have a lot of history with each other.I have another long time buy/hold client I am going to help walk through a first flip but she's in the most competitive price range so it's been tough finding her something.

to be a popular place for guests and investor competition so you can do better by dominating the niche you select.  

Not only that, but I cringe every time I see really green people talking about "putting deals together" and starting syndications - there are a TON of moving parts in large commercial deals, and even more competition from experienced investors and firms.

Here in Northern New Jersey, single family inventory is down over 25% from last year and there wasn't exactly a plethora of homes on the market then. This is also happening nationally (http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/24/w...

Some banks will have a very competitive portfolio product to work with.