I joined believing the community was here to help its members make such decisions, (smartly), and in some cases, partner together to improve the probability of success (and learning for the newbie!).

House hacking is the most powerful way to get started in real estate investing, and it sets you up for success because you learn so many things: dealing with contractors, how to screen tenants, lease negotiation, but most importantly, your goal should be to reduce or eliminate your housing cost, and there are a lot of ways to do with house hacking depending on your flexibility with strategy: rent by room, Section 8, mid-term rental, STR, etc, and you can combine multiple strategies too. 

@Aristotle Kumpis  There is no reson you can't combine buying Infill lot with Build to Rent.

This is before even the problem that these techniques and strategies work only in a limited number of opportunities, and these opportunities can only be recognized by someone with knowledge of real estate principles, law and finance. interestingly, what seems to sell nowadays is this pop cultural belief that education in anything but specific techniques is worthless; that something called motivation, combined with a positive mindset and an unwillingness to accept reality will triumph over anything else and lead to massive success.  

A former Rite Aid in Alpharetta, Georgia, has been transformed into Off Leash, a combination dog park and restaurant.

Let's say ARV is $300k, and sale costs are combined 8% so $276k net sale, that puts you at 80% of the total cost, it gives you a ton of margin for errors and mistakes that I would almost promise you will happen in a project like this. 

The combination of lower debt costs and rising cap rates is reinvigorating investor interest, particularly in prime urban locations.

You'll be able to take out half of your vested balance though, so not a ton.If you liquidate it, you're going to have to pay 10% (assuming you're under 50 years old) + taxes owed if it's pre-tax.So maybe a combination of the two using a HELOC on the equity.Is the 401k in the Roth portion by any chance?

The mountains aren't going anywhere and this is still the busiest National Park in the Country (busier than Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and Yosemite all 3 combined).

I mostly use MLS and local reports, but a tool that combines rental data, bylaws, and prediction models would be super helpful.