Trying to buy first rental property

[Kennedy Luckey]

Hey there,

New to investing and BP here, and I've been looking at buying my first multi-unit rental property, but I've encountered a dilemma. I have about 230k saved and I have great credit. However, I've been unemployed with no income coming in for the past 3 years. After talking to multiple mortgage brokers, It seems like because of this, it is impossible for me to obtain any sort of loan. My questions are; Is there any smart way to get into owning rental properties given my current situation? I have thought of buying a multi unit property (125-200k in my area) in cash and renting out the units to give me some great cash flow to live off of, but it seems like It would take 10+ years to scale this into multiple properties with just the cash flow provided from one property. I completely understand that If I somehow were to get a loan, I could leverage my money way more, but obviously that doesn't seem possible. How do you feel about buying properties in cash out right? Are there any other ways I can get a mortgage with no income history for the past few years?

Thanks in advance to anyone with some insight