NOI is your nominal yield amount, the cap rate essentially provides you a yield % on your investment which provides clarity for comparison to other real estate options or dividend paying stocks or interest bearing bonds or any other investment which provides some form of cash return outside of simply appreciation.

"What other professionals(contractors, attorneys, agents, etc..) if any are essential to be connected with before making that first deal?"

Many of them are essentially re-packaging deals from the MLS, I would think it obvious that those folks won't be much use to an investor.A good wholesaler gets you deals that don't hit the MLS.

I buy fixer uppers to create value, essentially buying some work.

You essentially just confirmed that the banks were right in turning you down for a HELOC.  

I understand its unsecured debt, and half of it was essentially credit card debt but my question is does anyone else experience this?

I essentially want to get into property management servicing and other interesting opportunities.Any advice would be greatly appreciated

He could essentially mentor you.

One of the moderators here J Scott posted: you're essentially asking a stranger to: - Devote a significant amount of time to you - Train you to potentially become their competitor I don't know too many people who would do that for a perfect stranger for nothing in return.

That is the value I see in a multi family not even considering the loan side of things @Sean Wait said go hard money to avoid the PMI by paying essentially cash to the seller and then refinancing using the propety's equity as collateral for the bank and borrowing from them to pay off the hard money lender.