He is an awesome guy and is basically setting me up to start a great and successful life in real estate, yet making me work hard and struggle to learn.

Since this thread was brought back to life, I would say that more buying opportunities exist now and will over the next year than when this thread first started.

Your lender can share their criteria, most investors won't meet it.For most investors, a PG is going to be a way of life from this point on for a long time.BTW, done properly a PG does not show up in any public records nor on your personal credit report.

It is looking like I will be spending much of my life here in Columbia, Missouri.

Depends where you are in life.

At this point in my life, though, what could I do?

What you need to do to accomplish this is to develope a buyers list filled with real investors looking to buy specific properties and you need to know how to find, negotiate, and "flip" them to your buyer's list.Best of luck to you, and do not let "fear" stop you as you mentioned.One of my favorite sayings in life is "The rich act in spite of fear, while others allow fear to stop them"

Lots of breakdowns, lots of vandalism and lots of "the machine took my money" stories from POd customers.That was one of the most frustrating parts of her life.

It involves a great deal of know-how and work, not just signing some documents and then listing/re-listing the property.I hope there isn't a wave of wanna-be investor's cleaning out their life savings to go prospecting in an area of town they know nothing about.

Looks to be pretty good, I'm all for helping each other around the problems in life.