thanks for the advice @Phil Z. what should be my first step?

Honestly this is know different from living in an area that you feel with have great schools for your kids school career, or going to work for a job for x, y and z reasons. 

That is the best bet. even so, no one will provide an education in A-Z in proper order.

I provide assistance to investors from A-Z Establishing  ARV, submitting unlimited # of offers, rehab cost, finding contractor, escrow, title and anything else associated with the transaction, all we ask is from you is to use us to buy/sell the property.Questions are always free :-) so feel free to contact me anytime.

@Phil Z.

This type of conversion could also work for rental units, because any new units are exempt from rent control.Perry Z., speaking of deals in Oakland, I purchased a duplex + cottage with an FHA loan which will meet the 1% rule whenever I move out of the unit I occupy.

In these areas, I go to all the Broker open houses, meet with other agents, visit the weekend open houses, and also spend some ad bucks promoting my name on Z, for example for a couple of the zip codes I am focusing on.

Hi tpm,nowadays, there are lots of free resources on the internet from which you can learn the A to Z of investing.

Attend a meeting, read X amount over Y weeks, pull your credit report and fix the mistakes (most credit reports have mistakes), save Z more each month or pay down a bill.

Z.