I would both buy a property to get your feet wet and at the same time make a plan to scale.  

If you were to buy direct from the owner you will get great deals!

I am still trying to figure out my buy box, but long term rentals feels like the right strategy for us.   

We would have to come oop about 400-450 for 2nd HH.Also planing to use other rest of heloc for a dscr or brrr so that would possibly help as well.Would you wait until rates drop to do another HH and just buy the brrr/dscr now?

As-is cap rate of 7.5% in my market (kc) would be pretty awesome to buy. 

@Jeffery Jones you understand you'll be buying Class C & D properties, not in the best of areas?

I also like to be set higher than most of my competition because I only buy really cool properties that are sought after.

Money cannot buy it..."

If you're looking at buying a rental or house hack in the Triangle, then you should consider short term rentals. 

There are two types of return from a rental propertyCash Flow & Appreciation.I normally also aim for a minimum of 8% return between Cash-Flow and Appreciation.Appreication, nationally, is around 2% to 3% annually.Therefore, your goal is to get the cash-flow to be about 5% to 6%.The issue is interest rates being very high, you would therefore, need to buy at a pricepoint where the numbers still make sense.You can always put down more of a downpayment to cash flow, but that will impact your cash on cash return calculations.Best of luck!