Do I need a deal in hand before anyone will talk to me about dispo, or is it the other way around

I'm reading this twice like I read everything, and the part I keep snagging on is the inspection period you mentioned. Is that the standard way out if you can't find a buyer, or is that something you have to negotiate into every contract yourself? Because if it's negotiated, then the beginner version of option one depends on being good at something you're also learning for the first time. That seems like two hard things stacked, and it makes option two look safer to me than the thread frames it.

juniper, you negotiate it, and how much room you get depends on the seller and the market and how the contract is written in your state. It's not a guaranteed exit and anyone signing one should have an attorney read the language.

plumb, the buyer conversations are genuinely cheap. I've had investors talk to me for forty minutes about what they buy purely because nobody ever asks them. What I'd warn against is thinking two months of coffee gets you a buyer commitment. Until you put paper in front of someone, everything they told you is a preference, not a purchase. So the conversations are worth having and they won't spare you the first ugly deal.

I did the second one and I'd do it again with one change. Two months of asking investors what they buy got me maybe eleven useful conversations, and out of those, four people were specific enough to be worth anything. Specific meaning a price band, a zip, a condition tolerance, and a rough answer on how they fund it.

The change is that I'd have written it all down in the same format from day one instead of in whatever notebook was nearest. trellis is right that preferences aren't purchases, and the way you close that gap is bringing one of those four an actual contract and finding out fast whether they meant it. So the two months has an expiry date. After that you're avoiding the deal, not preparing for it.