I meant to say "real estate attorney".

Yup that is what I meant.

However, I'm not sure I understand precisely what is meant by preparedness for multiple offer situation. 

Remember locks are meant to keep the us honest but will not stop a criminal mind who has it out to get you.  

Best of luck replacing your wife )I presume you meant her income)!

We each have equity built up from our own houses; neither of us have a lot of cash (again, looking to get started w/ family money); no stocks; and I do have some retirement (my partner does not).I guess what I meant by my statement of having $10,000 in tools was that it won't need to be built into our startup costs (loan), as heavily, as we already own them.

Not that her inspection was of any value due to time elapsed, it just meant that I would have had to do the same thing for my insurance to insure.

The numbers are meant to be basic and each property can be evaluated on its own at a deeper level.

I meant that I would be selling them all, in one package.

I suspect that once you experience something like "2008", your experience concerning the availability and investor ability to consistently choose only " deals" will change.No disrespect meant here, but the investment landscape is littered with the bankruptcies of investors who made tons of money during one type of market over one market cycle, and went broke when the market cycle changed.