Of course, it depends on what your goals are, but generally people fall into one of two categories:growth modeefficiency mode (trim the fat, 80/20 rule, etc)If you are in growth mode, you'd probably get about a $176k loan (80% LTV) and have $55k to play with. 

But that was me, YMMV if you have a fat w2.

Lets see, whisper tons of BS in your earConvince you the market is scarceTell you an appraisal before making an offer is sillyArgue with the bank when the bank appraisal tells you you're paying to muchCollect a fat 2.4% or more (which is a super big payday on a $30k house - lol)Buy all the best deals themselvesWhy do I feel I'm probably not making friends in this thread???

But I'm currently reading 4 other books so that was kind of put on the back burner but I probably should be reading that first! 

Too fat and happy I guess. 

Provide a Grasshopper or Burner number and monitor the incoming calls.  

SO I had to put real estate investing (REI) on the side burner -- still driving looking AT houses and getting to know more neighborhoods.

“Well you can just block them” This is true but they still have your main number, so all it would take to get their friends phone or simply get a burner phone to do the process all over again and you have no control.

If so, does one always need to keep a commercial lender on the back burner because private money will need to be retired before even 15 year "traditional" term?

You can jack up your net income and then have a bigger tax bill come tax time.Or you can minimize your net income and have a big fat tax refund come tax time.Valid point about effectively option B being an "interest free loan" to the gov't, but other than that you're not going to make or lose any money either way.