House Hacking plan to get started?

[Matt Joyce]

Hello BP community, I am new to investing and wanted some guidance/recommendations for my path to real estate investing. I have read "The Book on Rental Property Investing" and have been researching real estate investing in my free time. My brother and I want to get into real estate as a side business, currently we both have full time jobs and plan on keeping them. We wanted to buy a Duplex for our first investment and live it for one year (House Hacking). We plan on putting down around 3.5% down payment either using an FHA loan or a Conventional loan. After one year of living in the Duplex, we were thinking of house hacking another Duplex or buying our own home (SFH). We eventually want to have a few rental properties in the next couple of years and start an LLC. By the way, we plan on investing in Philadelphia, PA to start out. Does anyone have any recommendations or thoughts on this plan?

Couple of questions:

Would it be better to get an FHA loan, Conventional loan, or any other type of loan for a one year house hack?

Would it make sense to purchase another Duplex/Triplex after the first investment or get a SFH?

For starting an LLC, when does it make sense to form one? When you have a few investment properties?

Lastly, we plan on buying our first investment property in the winter to let the market cool down. If anyone has any advice or thoughts on this plan that would be greatly appreciated. 

Thank you for taking the time to read this and am looking forward to any responses!