I'm planning on (1) target potential, newly-listed leads (2) compare to similar properties (similar square footage, same number of bedrooms and baths, and in the same neighborhood)  that sold within the last 6 months (3) go physically inspect homes that seem to be listed below market value (4) if I see nothing wrong with the home, put it under contract and present it to my investors listAm I on the right track? 

(Great way to starting building a realtor-investor relationship)The bank makes the final decision regarding price after they order either a BPO or Appraisal or both depends on the lender.The short sale process takes usually takes 90-120 or longer days depending on the sellers cooperation and how fast the agent works with the bank submitting paperwork received from the seller but ive seen them go 6-12 months :(One warning really try and screen your seller to make sure there not using you the agent to just buy ore time in the property you must take there word on this but hopefully they have good intentions.The uglier the property for me personally I only love properties that look like the guy from lord of the rings (The Precious)Sorry for the lengthy reply just wanted to be thorough.Good luck!

, vacancies, and usual repairs, your returns are going to be paltry at best, and negative at worst.With condos in particular there is the risk of special assessments that are going to happen throughout the course of your mortgage.  

What I'm trying to say is that if you make a mistake somewhere and get into a negative cash-flow situation, you will likely have to sell the thing at a loss to get out of it (if you can't fix the cash-flow problem).Many people don't consider the fact that one can actually lose money investing in real estate.  

(Rookie mistake- I did not select personal owners and remove the duplicate addresses so once I scribed the list I only had 558 usable names).$190 for 14 months for a mailbox at The UPS Store$304 for 558 color post cards mailed from Vista print.$0 for a free Google voice number. 

Want to make money in real estate use the law of attraction, practice it, draw winners to you, positive thought, negative thinking will make you a loser.

How can make sure that I do not go over the comps basically putting my self in negative.

The Turnkey word evokes such negative reactions because of experiences just like this one.  

I only seem to be able to find avg rates for homeowners and its different for 4+ unit income properties correct? 

You could be trapped in a negative cash flow situation for a very long time if the market softens.