Often the best ones are the smaller community banks in your area, not the large coporate banks however they'll have options as well but its normally relationship based where you'll come in to the bank to meet them and they'll be looking over your financials, credit, investment experience, etc. however once you're in with one of them, it becomes much much easier to borrow with them in the future...

But, again, if you friends  in Indy know a thing or two about investing and can partner with you, where you both have a financial stake and they get "more" of the pie relative to their equity contribution in order to oversee the success, that would be the ideal scenario in my book.As for broadly in markets, both are considered pretty good.  

Premium increases are rippling through the market; the state is also always going to be financially strapped/high tax due to union pension commitments from past generations and the high tax, high services nature of Chicago.I'd highly recommend getting on a plane and driving around before you buy anything there. 

I’d love to have real estate provide some financial freedom/flexibility and create a portfolio that I could eventually get my kids involved with and pass down to them, but I end up feeling frozen/stuck based on the factors above. 

And, due to the arid environment, property upkeep generally remains minimal, saving on both time and costs compared to areas with high weather impact.Moreover, the mid-term rental (MTR) market in Las Vegas presents a significant financial upside, often doubling the rental income compared to standard long-term leasing.

The only chance someone has of getting 100% financing is if they can cross collateralize against other assets OR an unsuspecting seller financed deal.

Many think it’s strange to be scared of success, or they make fun of me for it, and I don’t understand it myself.I genuinely want to be rich and financially free; part of me believes I can do it, but deep down, my mind or whatever doesn’t.

If you bought in 2022, it doesn't look like they could be underperforming, it looks like you 1031'd into a soft asset that wasn't going to cashflow and now you would like it to cashflow.

You could then get a HELOC/LOC on that paid of property (a product that doesn't require you to use it) and then if you did have a big emergency you had a line to use on it.Now, ALL of this is dependent on how much money you have in the bank, how many properties you have, what your income will be like in retirement, what the standard age would be for your end of life (that's a scary one to think about), and while yes, you can certainly take equity out I just think it would be good to sit down with a financial planner...or even some other investors that are local to you that are around your age demographic and see what they are doing.I'm glad you are thinking about this for sure.  

There are so many boutique level asset niches you could get into, and that in of itself with likely send you to specific meetups and events to kickstart things.