Renting it out and taking a small loss to payoff the mortgage is a slow and shaky way to build equity, unless you have strong steady cash flow coming from elsewhere.

Not sure if that is a strong enough strategy.

@Falgun Chokshi I know Spencer and the team at gkhouses has a very strong presence in three of the markets you’re interested in.

I think everyone is right about having a strong team though I think it's hard to build that relationship initially. 

I'm here to offer you my strong educational & professional background and experience to help you grow your business, at the heft cost of gaining real world experience for myself!

Strong cash on cash return, with plans and financial readiness for great property management, are all part of my strategy going forward.

There are benefits to "knowing" as many agents as possible, but to truly build a team and strong bonds that will help further your investing future you need to focus and get to know agents and then chose ONE to represent you.

You could just write on a napkin "I offer to buy this property at ____ for $20,000" - but I would strongly suggest listening to @Chris Muller and paying someone to have a contract drawn up as a template.

My question to the group is in my area we are saturated with "Flippers" and have a very strong market that is not providing the most deals for rehabs.

The suburbs continue showing strong demand and growth with inventory dipping to 1.7 months ("balanced" market is around 6.5 months) and a median sales price up 7% to $323,000 in December.