Instead of putting your whole venture at risk through a single partner, I suggest you build a team of employees and develop solid succession planning.

I spent the prior 18 months obsessing over the markets, reading every book, diving into a massive rabbit hole with mobile home parks, and ultimately decided that in 2023, I had done the research that would suggest this journey is an absolute certainty. 

For someone looking for diversification or steady long-term growth without getting too hands-on, your suggestion of buying and upgrading a rental property in a familiar and appreciating area makes a lot of sense.

@Kareem Hammad With that amount of a down payment, I'd concur with @Julia Lyrberg suggestion about house hacking and expand from there. 

It needed a pretty good amount of repairs in order to make it retail ready.

This is after all construction in Los Angeles, if you've never done it before add 50k.If you have $500,000 in cash I suggest you use it elsewhere, this years long headache is likely not worth the 1000's of man hours you will also have to put into it running your very own team of scientists.

Any other suggestions?

Used your HELOC to fund the down payment on a second property if the right opportunity presents, otherwise those returns wouldn’t be juicy enough for me to take on more debt for the sake of scaling if you’re buying at retail. 

I work on projects across multiple states and have a strong network of contractors.Regarding when to involve a contractor, if it’s someone you haven’t worked with before, I’d suggest waiting until after the inspection.

also, happy to chat vendors, contractors, any other suggestions, etc. with you and be a resource anyway I can!