My name is Steven Barnes, and I am a young finance student looking to get into investment real estate. 

I think buying a policy after a foreclosure sale is like closing the barn door after the horse has left.

I have a section for evaluating it as a flip, and another one for evaluating rentals - it allows me to evaluate a rental in three different scenarios - regular purchase, ideal price and BRRR scenario - and also to compare deals apple-to-apple (since you'll be looking at so many houses that you'll get lost in numbers and features and no longer know which one is a good deal, which one is not and only looks good because of some subjective criteria, etc.).

But I'll take a tall white hot chocolate or hot apple cider from Starbucks almost anyday!!

You will find quotes all over the map which are usually apples and oranges as CPAs specialize in different things and have different business models (Flat fee, Subscription, Hourly, Hybrid etc).

So spending time & money trying to get them to pay for said damages is a non starter.Understand that proper tenant screening is a must. but it does not mean you will eliminate all bad apples.

I also want quality inspectors to review the house, wells, septic, barn, etc.At this point I still don't have a buyer's agent.

Seems like only the rotten apples are getting to foreclosure now that short sales are faster and easier to obtain.

Take a look at Reno, it's is a solid area for rentals because of the limited new construction, tech and manufacturing jobs moving to the area (Tesla, Apple, Switch etc.) along with the lithium loop of mining and recycling to manufacturing batteries and vehicles.  

I agree with Mike, I try requesting what the other bids were, to make sure we are comparing apples to apples, as well as learning where we can improve for the next time, or next client.