@Logan Jorns, basically, as well as literal "cash flow" estimations, guesses are also made of the assets' future appreciation in value, and how that value is expected to be impacted by the future (lower) buying power of each dollar.ie.

@Aaron T. 

Many investors have different views on these things, but my thought is to be as conservative as possible and then be pleasantly surprised when my properties beat my expectations.

Exact thing happened to me and I expect to see more of this.

Not knowing what to expect is a huge disadvantage that will eventually have you quit.Want to know what this blonde monkey would do?

You could either charge a flat fee that you hope will cover the expected cost.  

We are rigorously paying off student loans and expect to be done in about a year from now (April 2019, is our goal).

You might even think about setting up a lockbox with a bank like BB&T.

We are all trying to buy cheap, so we should expect offers and bids rejected if there is something better for the seller on the horizon.

I'm not too worried about funds in either case. they both want appraisal as expected and I'm a little worried appraisal might be somewhere around 200000 to 205000 dollars.