I believe I have found an opportunity working on a ranch that will allow me to live rent free, and save me a good deal of money throughout the summer, I am contemplating getting a mortgage or loan as I do not want to jump into debt quite yet, I guess my next question would be what type of Investment opportunities will I have once I have some cash built up.

I'm a Kansas City transplant living in the DMV area.

Dallas is more a city of transplants from the Midwest. 

So I looked into house hacking on LI before and will eventually do it when I purchase my first residence in the fall (i currently pay a lot of rent :) ) I am not sure where on LI you intend on living but for a multi family duplex I don't think it's possible to live rent free without expenses, but surely a rent discount is possible.

Our goal was to live rent free until we have enough money for our 1st house. 

@Ben Volkman,You will need a place to live-- you can either pay the rent   (est $1K/mo)-$12K/yr, or you can get a duplex and live rent free and you'll be at zero, even positive if you do a multi family house!    

We're seeing a ton of transplants from higher priced cities move to Atlanta, where an $800k new build home in cheap by comparison.  

Why not sell the house now, live rent-free for half a year, then when we go back to Chicago area we could buy another house? 

Another suggestion is to attend live real estate training events put on by "gurus" that teach people how to buy the asset classes you would like to invest in (i.e., Multi-family, mobile home parks, single family flippers, etc.).

I get to live rent/mortgage free, have no car payment, travel a lot (planned all of this out 5 years ago) and look forward to building up a nice portfolio of single family residences, multi-family homes, and big apartment units.