I’d say income wise, we live a fairly comfortable life style with little debt, slow growing savings, and regular traveling.

Might not seem like a lot to some, but that helps a great deal in my lifestyle.

Currently I live in Florida but I’m open to moving to another state and a smaller town lifestyle.

buy based on location, do a 10-15 year note, refi in 3-5 years with great equity to a longer term note then rent it outorsave your money while renting and put a larger dn pmt into a house purchaseorendless possibilities..... depends on your income, credit, commute, lifestyle, etc...There are not many good deals in Austin to house hack right now

With you being in Houston, you should check out a group called Lifestyles Unlimited.

We've done a lot of investing in Texas from Detroit.Since you are already in the vicinity of one of their offices, you should check out Lifestyles Unlimited.

We enjoy the lifestyle and were looking at buying land to build a home one like some of my other colleagues are doing. 

Without changing your current life style or rent numbers.  

- ‘lifestyle’ business – ie simply intended to be run by and to provide an ongoing source of work and income for the proprietors, no clear vision for the long term future?

Personally it sounds as though the people paying the higher rent live a little more of a chaotic/disheveled lifestyle from your description and add to that their unit sounds like it will require a major turnover when they vacate.