Finding first deal in Dallas

[Herman Santos]

Hello guys! So a little background about myself. I finished engineering school last summer and have been working since. I got into personal finance now that I was working full time and supporting myself and want to get into real estate to build wealth and have passive income. This summer, I'll be moving to Dallas where I finally want to make the leap to make to buy my first home (hopefully in the next 3-12 months). From initial research that I've done, I've landed on the idea that I want to use an FHA loan and buy a duplex so that I can rent out the other unit and live in one myself (I could also house hack my own unit, thinking about it, but haven't decided yet). I currently have saved around 20K, but expect it to be 25-30k in the next 6 months. I want to ideally put 20% down to avoid PMI and my parents would be willing to help so I won't have an issue putting down 20%, but I'd prefer to use the least amount possible. I've been reading the BRRRR book to learn how to use that process to my advantage and increase the velocity of my money. If I'm able to get my mortgage covered by tenants (and hopefully more), my savings rate just increases so much and I would like to start buying more rental properties (as well as perhaps doing an FHA again after the year on another duplex).

Can you guys critique my strategy or give tips on what else I can do? My work is in Carrollton so ideally I'd like it to be closer, but if deals are significantly better in other parts of town, I'm willing to reconsider. Also regarding my parents, since I've talked to them about RE, they're gotten very interested as they're nearing retirement in the next 5ish years and haven't really invested, but they are holding a lot of cash. What are some good areas of Dallas that someone with more money could invest in or what strategy could they use?

Also, do you guys have any agents you recommend that help out with the investor mindset?