Transient surveys are a proven method for uncovering the faint end of the accreting white dwarf population, including rare types of transients. Gaia Science Alerts, the transient survey based on the repeated Gaia scans, is ideal for this purpose, scanning the full sky at Hubble-like resolution and to a depth of G<20.7. Here I show what the outburst properties of a transient-selected sample of cataclysmic variables can reveal about the population and discuss the advantages of Gaia Alerts for a variety of accreting objects.