If you have good to excellent credit that is a bit high in closing costs. 

@Shawn Mcenteer excellent answer buddy.

There's a reasonable chance that I could qualify for a $1 million conventional home loan (based on my income, debt-to-income ratio and excellent credit score) and I could ask him if he'd be willing to wait for the 45-60 day close on the conventional loan (which he may be ok with, if he's selling to me); however, I only have about $30k to put down (not the $200k+ required for 20% down plus closing costs). 

Do you have any project management templates in excel or any other tool which could help?

you can plug in the numbers to the bp calculator - i use the bp calculator and my excel models to be sureAssumptions as an exampleassume $650/mo rent for each unitassume 8.333% vacancy rate (1 month)assume 40% operating expenses (kinda high but cap ex can be pretty stout)assume a 5% cap rate Cap rates are important to know with these type properties. 

Excel.

If you can, and want to, do more, by all means go for it...life is really short....Excellent points balanced with moderation.

That said, do not sign an agreement until you know them, have video conferences with them, be prepared. 

Even though retiring by 40 is an exceptionally early goal (or so I thought), we have realized that we can move that up WAY quicker by leveraging the fact that we have so much more disposable income than we need.After attending a BiggerPockets webinar, watching hours of YouTube videos and researching online, I have decided to take the plunge and buy my first rental property.

So an example, say I have an excellent plan, have met with professionals picked brains, learned about my local markets, and the properties, would it be difficult for me to seek financing from investors, having no experience?