Would it be wise to use a HELOC on our current residence to use for a down payment on a new property You can make $ investing anywhere.

Upfront expenses and monthly payments must be considered when calculating the return on your investment.EXAMPLEYou cash out $100,000 of your equity and use this as a down payment on a $400,000 investment property.

The low down payment house hack is the way to go.

A lot of them contain Balloon Payment Provisions. 

Thanks to COVID, for a couple of years, you can actually make enough money to be cash flow positive even if you hire a property manager AND have mortgage payments. 

In short, I can afford the additional $1100/mo cost of a second house, even until I rent it out.I have around $35K in HYSA and emergency funds that I could use for a down payment, but that's less than 20% which would be required for a conventional loan, assuming full purchase price.

It will be very difficult to cash flow in Austin using traditional LTR methods unless you put down a huge down payment.

Even at that price point, you may struggle to find a tenant, potentially leaving the property vacant for months.Here’s an example of a deal I’m currently working on:Purchase Price: $215,000Rehab Costs: ~$250,000ARV: ~$615,000Potential Rent: $3,600/monthUsing a $615,000 ARV and 75% LTV on the cash out refinance, with taxes and insurance, my monthly payment would be $4,267 using an 8.5% rate.

They are more useful IMO for getting chunks of equity right off the bat thru value add and then either realizing that equity by flipping it and using for a down payment on something bigger or hold a couple years and then sell at that point to do that then. 

Evict the tenant for non payment of rent.