I here you Adam and no understand how you feel.

Hopefully with the right tools and proper understanding of the real estate market i can become a successful home flipper.

Albert Zheng if you understand Cashflow with all expenses included not the kind you tell you friends you will sell.

If you understand what the appraisers will be looking for you can significantly increase values by documenting the repairs made by your contractors.

It's my understanding that hard money lenders aren't necessarily the formal businesses you might find online, but simply any person/entity willing to provide a short term loan, collateralized by property, and willing to take (mostly) interest only payments and defer full / majority repayment of the principal upon the term end.

So if there are any lenders on here that have no problem and would love to help a newbie investor get started that would be awesome, if not I understand but if you could point me in the right direction that would be great!  

Consider:  cash flow IS NOT directly related to the neighborhood;  it is related to rents in the neighborhood vs the FMV.The "working class" was my target market too so I understand that priority. 

I have a decent understanding of the numbers. 

I know I will have to pay incomes taxes as apart of this conversion, but I've been doing some reading and can't seem to understand if I will also be hit with additional taxes as a result of something called "pro-rata rule".

I understand that having a real estate license isn't essential to real estate investing, however I do want to get at least a year or two (maybe more) under my belt and truly learn the ins and outs of the industry before investing in my first property.