New guy from Seattle, WA looking to house hack

[Ben Lukes]

Hi everyone,

I've been interested in real estate for a long time and decided it was time to get serious.  I started listening to a few podcasts, including BiggerPockets and AskBP which led me to give the BP site a try.

Please check out my profile for more information about me.  My immediate goal is to buy a 2-4 unit property (possibly more), move in to one of the units, and rent out the rest.  Ideally I would like to do some serious value add investing, but given my current financial situation having just graduated with a master's degree, I'm looking for something I don't have to put a lot of money into right after buying it.

The two main issues I'm running into are: (1) I've been self-employed/an independent contractor for several years and was going to school for the past two years, so my last two tax returns don't look good, despite having reasonable income now. Banks don't want to lend me much (actually I've only talked to one so far, but the same should apply to other loans for the secondary market). (2) I'm worried about finding good deals in the Seattle market (which is expensive), and want to learn more about buying foreclosure, pre-foreclosure, and REO properties.

Anyway, I'm excited to join the BP community and learn more about how to make a good real estate deal.

By the way, I do have a master's degree in real estate, so I do know about the concepts and math behind the deals and am happy to help in any way I can.  What I need now is real world experience!