A smart investor once told me:"You can buy & sell real estate in any market, but how you buy and sell will depend on the market."7.

@Matt Pastier Hey Matt, it was smart that you held your ground and walked away after the 47k counter offer. 

@Colton Smart @Jeff PorterThanks for the shout out Colton!

Banking on that additional value as any significant part of the value proposition of an investment is probably not smart, so any deal in this area must make sense as is. 

So a smart way to look at it is to calculate 20%-30% of the purchase & rehab amounts from you, plus have 6-8 months payment reserves in either a bank account of a retirement account (as the lender wants to know that you have an emergency resource for payments if needed).Many rehab lenders can supply a sort of pre-approval to you so that you have an idea of what they will extend so you can formulate a game plan accordingly and target potential properties.

It all starts with being smart with the money you have coming in.

Replacing it with vinyl is a waste of money; as the owner I would pay the difference and upgrade to LP smart siding.

They are actually pretty smart and clever at what they do and offer.

Smart guy!

But don’t be afraid to jump into it - many investors just end up spending all their time looking at deals rather than investing.I would also recommend structuring it all in a smart way, since you are starting with so much money when you are also most likely to make mistakes that could get you in trouble.