Also take a quick look to see if you can reduce miscellaneous personal spending by any amount to make this dream come true.  

Use follow up questions to get them to further reduce their own price.If you want to learn more look up Michael Quarles  BP podcast.  

I watched it be reduced multiple times until it was at 45K.  

My banker says it doesn't matter what the closing date is, but it seems to me that closing at the beginning of the month would allow me to use current month rents to reduce my out-of-pocket cash needed at closing.

Unless you're a real estate agent and can perform the short sale yourself I don't foresee one paying a "fee" to take one on- they can be very tedious, time consuming and sometimes banks will reduce commissions which makes for a whole lot of work for little pay.Now, if you could be the actual end buyer on the deal (short sale)- then that would be worth exploring.

I'm scouring BP for articles on wholesaling in the hopes of reducing the number of mistakes I'll make with investors and sellers.I'm an Air Force veteran and I do art in my spare time.

To do so at the rate I want to, and without significantly reducing our modest lifestyle, I need feel that I need to also focus on doing a few SFR flips through the year to generate additional funds, to help accelerate the velocity of my buy and hold property acquisition program.Therein is where I find the rub.

Rent control REDUCES available housing.

You can reduce your Income from your regular job by this much. 

They get a really reduced price and then find a way to fix it for less cost to resale.