STR income: $130K/year.

- The property is probably NOT as profitable as you think it is.More reality for you - how are you going to cashflow enough from leveraged rentals to replace your current income?

If investing in real estate was easy, everyone would have passive income.

Could you put it on a CC and pay it off within the billing cycle with either your income or selling some stock if absolutely necessary?

Not a lot of our competitors offer this but it's something we can consider (but for us, it can't be in a rural area, the loan amount must exceed $150k, if we're using PadSplit income (or STR/MTR income) the max LTV is 75% and the down payment must come from your own funds). 

My income doesn’t show itself as being very high, but I have a relatively large amount of cash to put down.

However, with a SFH you will lower your standards when vacancy arises more than one month as you have no income coming in to male that payment.  

The intent of getting a sales agent license is to educate myself in Real Estate and create some additional income.

I don’t completely understand how I could best put my money towards a rental property or fund one with the income that I am making.

Secondly, the homeowner would need to cooperate as she would need to submit a bunch of paperwork including income statements, tax returns, etc. for the Short Sale application to show that she is insolvent.