With that being said, what is included in the "job description" of those of you who do work with an assistant of some kind? 

My descriptions usually start like this "The subject property is a 1200 square foot house per tax records.  

Pictures as well as a written description of any issues.

I've found that to be a good, easy solution when the loan amount is low enough.If you have been at your employer for a long time, or you have friends who would fit that description, some 401k providers will allow you to take out a loan for as much as 50k.

I love the basic description and $20-25,000 repair value estimate.

If I am missing anything in your description please share so we can talk it through.  

I posted a pretty long description of my experience and there is some other useful info in the thread too.https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/427...You are correct that banks will lend 70% of the appraised value.  

Listed on the description of her house was the key code to the lock box.

Based on your description of the condition in your previous post, $40K seems a little bit low, especially if you have structural framing issues and have to do concrete work (for just a non-structural gut, $40K was going to be my guess).For the sake of argument though, let's say it's $40K.With resale at $110K, fixed costs probably around $11K if you're paying cash (10% of resale is a good rule of thumb for cash deals), and a profit target of about $20K (wouldn't want to do it for less with all that work and risk), your max offer should be about:Max Offer = $110K - $40K - $11K - $20K = $39K

In regards to bidding on behalf of the seller - at least for Auction.com - this is only done up until the reserve it met, as the seller typically won't agree to anything less.