You can get a preliminary HUD1 to see the fees, and they should be willing to let you look at that.

NegotiatingAfter the walk-through and my preliminary due diligence, I made an assessment on what they would be worth, either as wholesales, rentals, or flips.

Once all of the above is known, and you have a preliminary site plan showing how many lots (and the size of lots) are available, you can start putting together numbers on the cost of the whole project.

She did a preliminary title search for me.

It sounds preliminary yet interesting.  

A good deal of preliminary preparation is advised before jumping in.

As more and more clients ask me to recommend property managers for their SFH, Duplex and Fourplex properties, I'm updating my due diligence checklist when comes to what to ask a property management provider:Here are some of the questions I have:Preliminary (Time in business):Operations (Geographical Footprint Of Properties Managed)Preliminary (Credentials / Associations Involved In)Operations (Number Of Rental Properties Managed)Operations (Property Type Managed and Percentage Breakdown Of Each)Preliminary (Personally Invest In Properties Managed)Legal Compliance With Fair HousingLegal (Insurance Carried)Legal (Contract Terms and Cancellation Policy)Legal (Company Sample)Operations (Managers / Staff Employed)Sales (Rental Price Determination)Sales (Vacancy Fees)Sales (Management Monthly Fees)Sales (Company Cancellation Fees)Sales (Miscellaneous Fees - Marketing, Cleaning etc)Operations Specific (Marketing To Good Tenant Base)Operations Specific (Tenant Income Requirements)Legal (Eviction Timeline - When Does It Start?)

A credible lender usually is very thorough and asks lot's of preliminary questions about a property before even considering it.Another red flag is most credible lenders have similar loan programs with slight variances.

The later makes since to me and meets all the preliminary tests but the former just  seems way off.

We wouldn't have to dive too deep and could issue you a preliminary term sheet pretty quickly, so you know what you're possibly looking at.