[fuzzfactor]

These are all good qualifiers and positive indicators of more likely success, and that's with only two comments so far.

Good advice on why and how this should be approached may still not give very accurate guidance about when.

I expect more good comments will follow, and the list could get quite extensive.

At some point (maybe even now) it may be impossible for any founder to meet all of these characteristics before launching a particular business, no matter how much time is spent in preparation.

So the real difficult question becomes "when do you start a business if preparations are not ideal and advantages are not largely stacked in your favor?"

I say when you can't not do it.