I think the biggest thing for me is to start taking action and getting around other investors.

Those are the ones I can get the biggest discount on and make the most money, and are also the most "pain in the butt" for listing agents, and the ones they want to get rid of the quickest.If it is an "easy" rehab, then an amateur investor will most likely pay too much for the property, put too much money into it, and then not make any money.

This makes it a lot easier at tax time to classify deductions.But I guess the biggest thing is not knowing what you don't know.

It feels like I have to make the biggest investment decision of my life with haste when making an offer.

After spending the past 37 years as a business owner, real estate investor and lender I can tell you they rarely do.The biggest problem I see most real estate investors encounter is always having access to enough money when they need to secure a project or complete a project.  

Biggest thing is to ask enough questions and get them to tell you how to solve their problem, it also allows them to disclose more and depending on how they respond, may allow them to discount the property. 

The biggest part of your plan should be the insurance policy.

I have read books my biggest challenge is doing it for the distance and sometimes not being able to see the property before I have to bid on it. have you or @Kristin Whitaker been able to find deals off the market in Spokane, I wasn't able to find any good wholesalers?

I would start at the largest brokerage office with the biggest market share, their phones will be ringing and generating leads, also find an agent in that office that has more listings than they can handle and do open houses for them Saturdays & Sundays, or commuter open houses during the week, here you will meet people and therefore more leads, problem here is that the commission splits will be lower since you are new and that is the typical formula...going to a fee based brokerage will cost you money monthly and you will be responsible for creating your own business since typically leads will be sent directly to the broker who's listing the buyer is calling on...work your network, that's where the best leads will come from in the end...just my opinion !

Stopping water from getting in is my biggest challenge as my tendency is to go all out to solve the problem but, if I put new siding on this, I'll be paying my buyer to take it off my hands:-).One trick I've been using to keep costs down is to buy gently used.