Do I need to hire a lawyer?

[Iris Hou]

I'm a newbie from CA trying to invest in my first rental property in TX or some other states with healthy RE market (good cash flow and landlord friendly). After doing a lot of research, I heard a lot of different opinions regarding creating a land trust, LLC, or get insurance. I'm a small small investor so an just trying to get enough reasonable coverage of my assets and in the meanwhile keep the filing/maintenance cost low. Some people said that it's not really necessary to have one as a beginner, but I feel because I'm a small investor with limited amount of asset, I have to get things right in the beginning and protect the "seed money" well so I can continue to grow. Does anyone have any good experience/suggestion to share?