Eventually, I thought there was too much risk (market saturation) and I chose another STR market.

I took a partial withdrawal of $42,000 from my 403B plan five years ago to buy  a forclosure for $50,000 in cash.The property has been rented to the same tenant for almost five years now and I have collected almost  $50,000 in rent.Today the property is worth  $135,000 and I took a Heloc on it last year to buy two duplexes.I didn't mind paying the tax because I would have to pay it eventually anyway,  and the penalty of $4,200 I got back in five months from rent.

I would need to probably include farm profits in my calculations because the hope would be to eventually farm full time, but also supplement current income till I can move to farming full time. 

When you eventually get a deal under contract and only have one lender if the lender decides not to do it then your stuck. 

I intend to do rental arbitrage to start and then eventually purchase.

So if it comes to starting out like you said, I do believe single family 1-4 units is the way to go until they can eventually build up to get to multi family. 

Some people get lucky and enter the game when everything is easy to sell, but the market eventually dries up.

@Michael Ablan Just wait until you find one of your tenants unconscious and unresponsive due to a narcotic overdose. 

Although right now is a fairly tumultuous time to get into the space I would do what you can to dive into education as to how to evaluate deals and what you eventually want your portfolio to look at both in terms of composition and risk profile. 

A lot of duplexes listed are way overpriced and if you can find one thats listed over 60 days you can probably win an offer eventually with that strategy as well (I almost got one like this as well on loopnet).