You can take an apartment building with problems say 40% occupancy and deferred maintenance and bad tenant mix and management problems and use commercial hard money.You will have to figure in the high debt service while turning around.Once stabilized you will refinance out at the new value up to a certain LTV.Take the money and do it again.The larger the project the more the potential ARV spread after stabilized but the more risk.The larger projects take more time to turn around so the churn rate on the money is slower.What happens and I have seen this is people run out of money and the property is taking longer to stabilize than thought.Then you have some money left but not enough to take down a property yourself until you unload this other deal you bought or refi.You then start partnering with different people on different projects which can lead to a mess.You don't just want to grow out of impatience or doing more deals and then get involved with the wrong people or overt extend yourself.You want smart,well thought out,controlled portfolio growth that is highly calculated.

We try to get as specific as possible when estimating rehab costs, as this is an area where investors tend to fail, often leading to poor returns and in some cases losses.

I definitely agree with Jason - septic tanks can lead to serious problems, so it would definitely be a good idea to get an inspection if you are going to purchase the house, or avoid the property altogether.

Do any of you guys use internet marketing to capture good, high quality leads?

The excitement of the deal fades, the promoter moves onto the next deal and future investors sense your desperation - leading the sharp ones to ask for a bigger cut - or worse, part of your promoter share.

but it still is a conflict, and thereby inevitably leads to questions and loss of confidence when the situation above happens with tenants

With this new lead certification requirement, I would think you would need someone certified to start work on older homes.

I would lead with $20,000 in down payment assistance.

I've been getting leads and talking to sellers for close to two months now and many of them have Free & Clear properties.If the asking price is too close to the ARV, my choice is always to talk them to seller finance the property.I've being told by other experienced investors that buyers nowadays don't have huge down payments.

I think people buy multifamily with not enough reserves, don't plan for capital improvements, start deferring maintenance, slowly the deferred maintenance catches up, resulting in less occupancy which leads to foreclosure.