If that is the case I really can't see why you should not pay off the consumer debt.

Where is consumer's right here?

This may help you look at a property and potentially submit an offer before anyone else (general public) will see it. ( i purchased my last property 2 weeks ago in this manner).never hesitate to let anyone know you buy properties (Friends, co-workers etc.)...you just never know if a friend of a friend of a friend needs out of their situation.Try driving (Time consuming) around in the neighborhoods you might be interested in.

What Karen Mikolainis said - if you put it all down into a spreadsheet, I think you may find that renting where you NEED to live and investing where you WANT to may make the best sense - and will more than cover up the need to pay for the services of a good property manager and others - if you follow the deals to where the money is.Also, being remote will free you from being emotionally and time-wise consumed in management of your property/ies.I second that.

It is a VERY time consuming process and next time around, I will definetly just purchase a list but for thr first go at it, I wanted to try on my own just to understand how it's done. 

The challenges are offering seller financing to consumers in the post Safe Act environment.

However, I believe that used properly it can be used for good. for example reale estate leverage. used unproperly ( example - credit cards for consumer goods) can be a bad thing. now, when you use a specific scenario as you did Tom Goans, you can make a point. answer me this. you -you pay cash for a 100k house and rent it for 1k a month. you have no cash left. you owe no money on the house so you can lower rent to $850 if needed.me - put down 20k and borrow 80k for the house, but i have 80k in reserves.

If you're a landlord and your tenants suddenly can't afford your rental rates because their consumer debt has gotten more expensive, you're affected.

My wife and I are looking to start our real estate investing business and are trying to consume as much info as possible to hopefully avoid a few mistakes down the road!

However, sounds like the FIL could manage and GC the rehab on the flips, such that it wouldn't be so time consuming for you.