I've not been able to validate this piece of information, but it sounds valid.You probably already know that: Habitat for Humanity and their partner families have rebuilt numerous houses, with about five planned every year- one of my friends from Boy Scouts from the Bronx is a team member .  

Drew,I would connect with a private lender in your area who already has expertise in multi-family housing and see if he/she would be interested in a partnership with you.If you were willing to put in your $10K and be an on-site manager for the property, I know a lot of investors would be happy to put in some cash into a property in a fast-appreciating area.If you scouted out a really good deal (<80% of market value) and use $1-5K as earnest money on a contract that was closing in 60-90 days (give yourself as long as the seller will let you), you can tie up the property and shop it around (but be careful about SEC regulations - it's about HOW you shop it, but this is completely legal if you comply with the laws, you'll want a good lawyer for this deal anyway).Most investors with extra capital are very busy and short on time, so if you can keep finding, acquiring and managing properties with the right person it could be a great partnership where you both benefit.

I  always see Wharton being at the top of finance, real estate, etc. in posts and I read that to get in to Wharton you obviously need great grades (which I have) and something like great diversity or something and write a compelling essay on why you should be at Wharton(it's obviously harder than I made it sound), after Highs school I plan on enlisting in the Army for about 6 years, I'm an eagle scout and I am related to a founding father, other than that I dont have much more to put for the "Diversity/Culture section" Back to degrees the reason I don't want to get just a real estate degree is I would like something to fall back on in financing or something similar to real estate developing if the risk in real estate gets too high for me.

The double yellow lines is a decent indicator, but also scout out about a mile or two from the location you're looking into to see what is around the area. 

As far as "thinking outside the box", because of my "creative wiring" I have not only never been in the box, but do not know or care about the box.Unless...unless there are mint girl scout cookies in the box!  

According to Neighborhood Scout, "Vacant apartments or homes are a major fact of life in Georgetown Rd / W 34th St.

If you're looking for a passive investment (either full-service turnkey when one company handles everything from prop scouting, rehab, to management, or self-assembled team where you find an agent, contractor, and PM yourself) then most people look to the South or the Midwest.

Your profit margin with Tk is, typically but not always, going to be lower than if you scout props, rehab yourself etc., because you're paying for the luxury of having someone else take care of everything for you.  

Rather than buying from a turnkey company I used a realtor to scout properties for me and identified a recently renovated property that was partially rented.

Matt, I used to use Neighborhood Scout but didn't find it very helpful.