@Matt Humps you mean look somewhere other than Marietta, GA?  

Great resource for people intending to utilize the FHA program to house hack up to 4 units across the US.  Being

We also often requested customer to start banking with us. Be

Have you considered looking at a market with lower price entry (lowering your risk profile on the first property helps get over the initial hump)? 

We added usb charger outlets above the bar area in our place because we had heard renters go gaga over them ( plan to rent out later).

I need as many specific examples as possible, please.Is there a "typical rule of thumb" on the number of properties you are personally managing/owning that would likely put you over the hours qualification hump? 

For many people getting over the hump of the first deal is the biggest challenge, so it's great you're looking for your second property.I think that yes, in your situation getting a 3-4 family multifamily rental would be the next logical step.Since you're still early in your investing career, I don't know that I'd recommend the third option you proposed, specifically using hard money to buy a rehab.

This is caused by a few trends but the most pronounced (in my opinion) are the facts that ~60 people move to Charlotte a day and almost all new inventory that is being built starts at $450k.If you own houses on the affordable side, supply and demand are going to continue to push up the prices up.Personally, I don't see us being able to build <$300k houses within the next 5-10 years and I also don't see the influx of people moving slowing down.

I see you are down south, would us being in Michigan be an issue? 

I store backups: on my main hard driveon an external USB drive (2 TB)in Dropbox (2 GB for free)in PCloud (10 GB for free).