Also the things you did yourself were never performed by any contractor or employee. 

@Chad Castanino Welcome.You should save everything you can (Cash is King).Concentrate on all the information that's on your radar for your niche (i.e. if you're going to do Flips, focus on flips and the paperwork for them, you can do Auctions, Multi families, etc later).And don't forget "all that glitters is not gold" (only about half the information here is accurate;-(

High performance insulation/envelope and drywall HERE WE COME!

Is there usually any up front fees or do they only charge once they perform a service for me? 

Its time to get an attorney on this if nothing else to perform risk management because the deposits are not your money but property of your tenants.

Is this accurate of him to think that?

If you want to be sure of the accuracy of a flood map and the location of a particular house you might try having a structural engineer look up the location for you they always seem to have access to the most accurate information as they have to design any building to be structurally sound on any location or tell you if its not feasible and just move on to another property. 

Martin It would be a really good itdea to have an experienced Architect perform an accessibility review of your property for compliance with accsssibility standards.  

Just ensure your ARV and market rents are accurate and hope the seller bites.Looking forward to what the seller responds with.

We have built both companies on intergity and that's one principal we stand firm on, we have licensed contractors to give accurate estimate cost for repair and an offer an home inspection to give the buyers the truth about the home that they are interested in.