Whatever approach aligns with your goals, I would hook up with a solid team focused on that investment strategy with the experience behind them—no need to pay your dues if someone else has and you can learn from them. 

thanks Greg, yeah in NJ I pay $50 for LLC creation and 100 for boilerplate operating agreement for each of my properties to get an LLC set up online in 5 minutes and spits out the same documents  vs. $1500 for a lawyer so its just common sense to not use a lawyer and throw the $ away.     

So if you buy a 5 bedroom house and rent the spare 4 bedrooms = you can still sell tax-free under the 121 (you just pay back depreciation) If you buy a duplex and rent 1/2 and live in 1/2.

It's worth paying a premium for the brick buildings that were built for multifamily.

Also there is a management fee to pay for all of the above.

Before you pay for inspections, estoppel, etc. go look at the property yourself.

. - If you just personally paid for the renovations then the interest won't be deductible because "paying yourself back" doesn't qualify. 

Section 8 pays $1,590 for a 3BR unit.

In addition, you've got your HELOC on your primary you'd have to be paying back also.

Buy and holds is the key to true wealth with all the benefits of depreciation, appreciation, loan pay down by your tenants, leveraging the equity, cash-flow etc etc, but it often times isn't the active income that pays the bills until you build up a portfolio and even then there's the tenant management or managing your property managers.That's why I'm involved in all 3.