Or in low volume areas, a public/private partnership with existing child care centers. 

It's a balance of cashflow and wealth accumulation.One of the goals is to have tenants pay as much of your cost-of-ownership as possible (loans, taxes, insurance, etc.)In high-cost areas, any Class A or B property you buy will usually negative cashflow for the first 3-5 years, until rents rise enough to cover the negative cashflow + rising taxes & insurance.Investing OOS increases your risks because you may not know the market and you can't check on everything/everyone all the time.If you move forward with your buddies, HIGHLY recommend creating a solid Partnership Agreement!

you cannot realistically buy real estate when you have no personal funds.but what you can do is work to put a partnership together where you find a money partner and you guys do a JV  money partner you do the work.. this can happen if you find someone who takes a shine to you and wants to help U

Using your first property as collateral could help reduce the cash you need upfront, but it’s essential to weigh the risks and it's not really recommended specially if this will be your first.I recommend focusing on building reserves or seeking partnerships to fund flips.

Focus on cash flow to align with your long-term goal of a remote ranch, and continuously educate yourself while networking to identify opportunities and partnerships.

I found it listed on Crexi, it was a dissolution of partnerships and we able to raise the funds and negotiate a quick closing.

The WY LLC was named as managing member of the TX LLC .Also should I consider having only myself as the manager (and not add my spouse) - otherwise it becomes a partnership and I would have separate cost to file a partnership return? 

They have a bunch of free videos out there related to the Income Snowball and their new partnership with rent-to-retirement, and a very savvy "numbers person" could probably surmise and re-create the system on their own if they really want to be cheap. 

I chose to invest with RTR with the intention of building a long term partnership, and wanted to grow my portfolio exclusively through them.

This type of partnership will likely include managing partners and acquisition managers tasked with finding and structuring the deal.