.: I'm very new to this and would love to get your thoughts on this and are there any downsides to the process?

Take your 50k and get a 15-30% return on it unless you’ve hit your financial goals.

But you’ll get AT LEAST 5-10% less because it’s occupied.

Buyers are less likely to get into budding wars in many areas and putting together a solid rental which cash flows from day one at at least 10% has been our approach for the last few years. 

If you're willing and able, I do recommend the "house hacking" strategy which is just a fancy name for buying a rental property and living in one of the units, because you'll get very favorable financing - an owner-occupied fixed-rate 30-year mortgage.I'd also say, analyze that property as if you won't live there and it's a pure rental, and make sure the property is still cash flow positive if there's a tenant in your unit because then you'll know if it's actually a good investment.And when you analyze it, include payment of a property manager in your #s because if you don't, and doing so would make it go cash flow negative, then you've just bought yourself a job because you literally can't step away from managing it without losing money.

I am considering Get Clearing and QuickBooks for the accounting software.   

I have a window into the PRE REOs coming to me, and lately, that list is getting LONG.

We also have a couple meetups I can get you connected with. 

I only have one that seemed to fail to launch.What I do get more is I offer to run a newbie through a transaction and/or show them the work in progress and I get either no show or barely show. 

Weekend work is emergency only and it gets billed out at double our rate .