"How do I get started in CA?"

And for sure its a cautionary tale to others and going forward you will know how to protect yourself..

You gone bleed yourself dry at those numbers. 

Sub2 has been around a lot longer than Pace as a season pro like your yourself can confirm.

It doesn't seem this "accelerator program" is offering anything of true value and quite frankly I am surprised someone such as yourself who has 10 years of experience and owns 50 properties would fall for a gimmick.

But I purchased land in cash and leveraged it to build a new construction stick built home.

a lot of it. 

@Adam M.Who has time to do that, much less the time to wait for a container to come in etc?  

Best time to get a heloc is when you do not need the heloc! 

Once you have a property under your belt and it's stable, do it again.