As I'm only 2.5 hours away, I would go up every other week to take a look at the progress and make sure everything I wanted done was getting done.

Mine doesn't really understand crap about investing, but I don't need her to evaluate a potential deal. 

See below:http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/49398-what-is-the-best-way-to-evaluate-repairs-needed-http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/51045-basic-rehab-analysis-spreadsheethttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/48724-repair-estimate-formhttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/48425-approx-costs-of-rehab-itemshttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/39421-guestimate-as-to-how-much-this-house-will-cost-to-rehabhttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/43024-project-repair-estimate-formhttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/39751-estimate-template-available-just-contact-mehttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/24/topics/23599-easy-way-to-estimate-costshttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/93/topics/46870-estimating-repair-costshttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/39231-best-book-course-to-learn-how-to-rehab-http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/67/topics/39546-project-order-for-rehabshttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/24/topics/17301-free-bid-form-download-here-http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/53/topics/44127-home-repair-estimatorhttp://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/88/topics/46567-complete-rehab-deal-analysis

There is no progress without struggle.  

If it’s a few weeks, you can do a progress payment but it’s hard to tell when starting out what good progress is. 

The loose wording stems from my loose and changing feelings about it.The rest of the advice I'm really digging.Thanks again for taking the time to evaluate and offer improvements on my approach!

The second give you many different formulas to use when evaluating real estate.

Once you've done that, you can then evaluate markets against your criteria.

Hello BP-I am evaluating the best route to fund my first flip. 

If it’s the other way then they plan on bumping rents aggressively and you’ll want to dig in there.When evaluating financial projections of any kind it’s important to ascertain the assumptions that were made.