Help for a young guy starting out in the SLC, UT area :)

[Jeremy Pixton]

Hey everyone! I am a 20 y/o male, and I would like to get into REI. I read Rich dad poor dad when I was around 12 years old and recently reread it, and now I am super excited about REI and I really want to get started. Currently I am a renter paying about $700 per month, and my lease will be up in a couple of months, but I HATE basically throwing all of this money away! My goal is to get a duplex, triplex, etc. so I can start saving more money and live rent free, and in turn invest more! From listening to a fair amount of episodes from the BP Podcast and reading a couple of books, I am thinking my best option to get started would be by using an FHA Loan because of the low down payment. I am currently making 16/hr and after doing a little looking around, it seems that the properties in the SLC area are rather expensive (around 200k), especially for someone like me who is starting out. However I have only lightly looked around on sites like Trulia, Zillow etc. and I have heard that they usually aren't the best resources compared to having a real estate agent with the MLS. I am very thirsty for information and I want to get the ball rolling so any thoughts or advice would be awesome! So my questions are: Would an FHA loan be the best option for me? Would I even be able to afford a property in this area? If anyone has information about my situation/market that they can help me with I would GREATLY appreciate it! :)