If not, you could buy a primary residence with the intent to at a later date turn it into a pure reno ... if so, you could turn it into a rental and invest in your next primary residence without selling ... this way, you could secure a property with as little as 3.5% down on much higher quality assets that have a much better chance at appreciation and you could add some value to via sweat equity and control hands on since they are near to you ... much better strategy IMO ... never underestimate the power of your home court advantage investing locally, or conversely the disadvantage you face going out of state. 

We painted the whole house ourselves (talk about sweat equity), had a 320 foot privacy fence built in the backyard, updated both bathrooms, and swapped out mirrors, lights, and other fixtures to modernize it.

With some sweat equity, donated professional expertise by my father the HVAC tech, and all my weekends the summer of 2023, I plan to pull almost $200k in equity from the house with a mortgage to continue investing and moving my investments further, and should still have about $100k left.

We put a lot of sweat and equity into that building with some help from family and friends.

We purchased many that had long "days on market" scaring away other buyers, so our properties all have sweat equity. 

In other words, don't sweat it and keep it simple.

Can you scrape together $5k, and find a find a seasoned investor willing to let you put the cash, and your time/sweat into one of their projects?

We’ve owned 3 homes and have always bought fixers and built sweat equity, so now we’re looking to do the same with long term rentals.  

Unless a tenant doesn't stay a year, we expect costs and don't sweat it. 

The same can be said about many aspects of life.I have tried to simplify my investing framework into three categories: Time, Money, and Skills.They are all a leg to a three-legged stool, every deal requires all three.As a new investor, you need to know which of the three you can offer and if you can't invest any of the three then you are not willing to do what it takes.Time can equal learning skills, making money, or putting in sweat equity.