Especially Pay for Help.I'm more concerned about digging up a basement for more headroom which can reduce the integrity of the footings while your working:-(

I could have used my VA loan to get started which would have been a huge help to get my foot in the door.

I'm trying to make sure I get started on the right foot and don't develop any bad habits for future projects. 

Closer to 50 I might take my foot off of the pedal some.You can work as much or as little as you like.

Don't wait for the season.Also, don't fret too much about your first deal being a huge success.You won't be good at something the first time you try it.Just get your foot in the door.

My parents were relieved, since rightly or wrongly the family members would probably regret it later if they had just let the property go in a foreclosure, since there was some modest amount of equity due to the recent market upticks. 

With the amount of student loans I'm currently paying, I think this could be very beneficial financially for me and could relieve some burden off me as well.

We ended up selling for a record price per square foot, but it still wasn't as high as it should have been.

Yes, sometimes the left hand doesn't know what the right foot is doing within a bank......but the result is the same, the foreclosure is done, and the short sale possibility is over.  

For low- to mid-level finishes, anything over $3 per square foot (area square footage, not wall square footage) in a typical area, and anything over $4 per square foot in an expensive area is high in my experience.