Paid off rental property....now what?

[Clinton Davis]

I bought my 1st deal (single fam home) in 05 and it's now paid off free and clear...however, i only did one flip since then and decided i'd throw my money away buying a furniture store right before the housing bust in late 07.... filed for bankruptcy in 09 and since then had my tail between my legs.  I've been grinding away working my 9 to 5 and one thing is I've never had to claim 100% of my income because i work on tips.  So anyway, I was able to keep the rental property and now it's paid off. but due to my income on my w2 and my bankruptcy histore (9 yrs ago) I'm having a hard time getting financing as that always comes up.  My credit is low 700's and i'm ready to get back in the game.  My rental brings $850/mo and i have a cash reserve of $50k from building restoring cars.   

If i cannot get financing that makes sense, should I try to find a single fam home to buy cash for 40-50k and use the cash flow from both properties to build up and buy another and so on and so forth?

Would I be able to get a heloc on my 1st property and use the equity in it to buy a second rental??  

What would you do in my situation??  Thanks for your help.