One of my friends is possibly the largest non-syndicate owner of units in the west southbay area.  

Howdy!  Super new here y'all but I'm thinking of buying a fix and flip and (or) also a place to rent.My concerns are with covid people didn't have to pay rent but landlords still had to pay mortgage. If that were to h...

Any suggestions on how to get the old 40k IRA available to use as a down payment into real estate?

As noted above, a non-QM loan product such as DSCR  could be suitable if you don't have a W2 track record.

No plumbing inspector should be pointing out non-plumbing things unless he is also the CO inspector which is unlikely.

I would say 5-5.5% is the sweet spot for when folks will demand will rush back, partially due to mortgage payment affordability and partly psychological, after seeing both 8% rates and 2% rates in just the last handful of years.

Home features, location, down payment and interest terms, amortization and balloon terms?

Where I live in Florida, payment is due the next day... in cash or certified funds.  

Many of the people here on BP unfortunately do not understand how to evaluate risk - because if they did they would not be doing a lot of these creative finance deals we are seeing that include having to borrow for the down payment because they have zero liquidity.

The calculations I ran had an 8.5% rate (poor timing on my part)First moving part, paying down your mortgage early allows for more of your monthly payment to go to equity pay down rather than interest.