I've established a very stable  I've determined that local properties should be my first choice and by local I mean within 1.5 hours of my primary residence.

My primary interest lies in the Houston market, but I’m open to exploring other areas as well.So far, I’ve read The Book on Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner and am currently working through The Book on Managing Rental Properties.

The primary reason why people form a company is to limit their legal liability from lawsuits.

Another option may be to secure the loan using primary residence as collateral. 

I would like to eventually leave my 9-5, pay off student loans and get rid of PMI on my first property ASAP.The townhome is my primary residence and I will answer any questions and be grateful for any guidance.

I am open to local primary residences for house hacking or out of state investment properties in high rent low house price markets.Thank you all for your help!

I would say 2/10 are investors, the rest looking for primary homes. 

LTR is more plausible but often HOA requires primary residence for a period of time before renting it.  

A) while there are a lot of groups that have, what I consider, a primary initial backer, most "syndications" are raised in $50-100k installments.  

I am also thinking of using a cash out refi on my primary residence along with some cash that I have saved to finance the purchase.