@Irene Q Paras If the seller is willing to hear your offer then it is fair game.

What you are talking about is a numbers game.

Brand new investor from NJ with a lot of varying interests. 

They currently have a large event the third Thursday of the month, LOTS (Learn on The Site, flips) the first Tuesday after the meeting, weekly Wednesday Luncheons at Wildwood Country Club (12-2), Ed Gibson brings in speakers for a monthly KREIA luncheon at Napa Valley, they have Robert Kiyosaki game night (Writer of Rich Dad, Poor Dad), and a monthly Happy Hour.

That's a great step and it sounds like you have a good game plan in place. 

Buy a cheap, in distress, property with cash and budget a rehab that makes sense with comps in the area for an ARV, make the profit on the sell and roll it into another.Basically you have options it all depends on your game.

The P&L I received from the owner could have been written on a napkin and glosses over repairs made to the water/sewage line--the current owner says "costs varied" because he was able to do a lot of the repair work himself. 

I suggest doing it up front if possible.And don't use the 50% rule for expenses... totally varies from market to market, price range to price range, etc.

It varies from community to community. if the property is pretty well maintained and newer mechanicals you can adjust your budget for less to set aside for repairs.

I try to keep so fixed and some variable rates, vary my maturities to only have a certain percentage mature each year and make sure to keep my overall debt levels to a certain percentage of my overall portfolio value.