If you are responsible and unselfish enough to not dip into your own stash.

I was pushing to see what was available beyond the FHA, because I made another noob mistake of depositing a fairly large sum of cash into my bank account that I had been stashing away.

I am still looking for places to stash my cash away to earn the maximum return while I'm building up my savings, but I have definitely considered the benefits of leverage.

Personally I stash away 5k in my savings account before I buy each property.

People are stashing their cash in microwaves etc. with banks charging negative interest rates.

I get W2 income which I can stash away in a Solo 401K as the $18k employee contribution, and then my employer (i.e., my LLC) can stash away more up to the IRS limit.I would rather now give you specific advise like you are asking.

Before I got on the site I wasn't stashing cash for the stuff.

Allows them to feel like they may get a benefit at the end and you can collect some extra rent that could be stashed as a security deposit.

Do you recommend stopping the index fund investment and instead start stashing away cash in my savings acct?

Wouldn't it be more efficient to take the original pot of money and stash it away in a 'plain' investment account ?