----- Pretty houses no equity in my opinion is where people should start in REAL ESTATE INVESTING  Make 10,000 a month, get out of debt,  get your credit rating stronger, and save up 50,000  You can make money faster  with creative financing in a tight credit market like today than Wholesaling or rehabbing flipping .thanks @Steve Vaughan

When you start letting fear control your decisions, that's when you start missing out on things in life (good and bad) which in one facet or another only make you a stronger person in the end IMHO.

It will only forge a stronger relationship with the title company as well.

Direct mailers, when you're targeting the right people with the right message, you're going to get much stronger results than a sign placed out, especially if you're in a "sign heavy" area advertising all sorts of junk.

@David C. you have plenty of bullets. 1) 250K private lender with a track record of paying them back2) You have experience completing a rehab, which is probably stronger because it almost took you out. 3) You have a track record of refinancing out of a rehabIf you're strategy is to buy, rehab, rent and refi......I believe inner Portland is the place to be.

The MBS market is actually strengthening a bit (if MBS stronger, lower mortgage).

Once you learn the ins and out of the business you know how to properly assess risk versus upside when buying a property.Example if a stand alone Popeyes restaurant paying 30 dollars a foot for a 2,500 sq ft building base rent plus NNN expenses on absolute NNN leases and only 5 unit franchisee the risk can be HUGE DOWNSIDE if corporate Mcdonald's paying the same rent per foot for the area and much stronger tenant.

How can I get started, I want to take the first step and I don't want to rely on the friends that introduced me into this even though I am planning on working with them because a team is stronger than a single person and more money can be made.

Remember, if your DTI starts to suck and banks don't like what they see-you can ALWAYS add a partner to the deal in order to make you a stronger borrower!

However if the properties are seen as having different owners as a consequence of the different LLCs, you might not be able to offset the stronger one with the weaker (from a taxation perspective).