So what would the pros do in situation.

[Conrad Metzenberg]

I'm a in a great spot, yet somewhat stagnant. Like many others here I feel the market is pretty expensive right now and that a correction is near.  I own a small house in Santa Barbara, CA that now has about .5 mil of equity.  Currently, the cyclical field I work in is at the bottom of it's downturn, this makes me fairly cautious about leveraging myself too any great extent.   I'd like to continue building my wealth.  I'm interested what the experienced investors here have to say.  No sales pitches please.

[Joe Splitrock]

@Conrad Metzenberg have you ever owned or operated rental properties in the past? I am not sure I would recommend you to leverage your home to buy out-of-state rental property as a first time buyer. I would save up for the down payment and buy a SFH in a stable market. Find a home in the $100K range and put $20K down on it. Look for 3 bedroom, 2 bath. Beware that many CA investors find properties out of state and have problems. They come on BP all the time with their troubles. Usually they don't go to look at the property. They forget that other parts of the country get rain, flooding, snow, cold weather, etc. They buy turn-key with a crap tenant in place that is nothing but trouble. They burn through property managers who just take advantage of them. If you are willing to work through all this, then move ahead. Also, I would be less focused on an LLC and more focused on finding the right property and saving up money. Unless you are extremely wealthy, the LLC is more advanced than a beginning investor needs to worry about.