Every person and every situation is different though, I've heard plenty of horror stories about working with friends and family. 

My wife and I made our first big leap into the STR world when we bought a 3 story house with 9 beds, 4 baths, a jacuzzi on the 3rd floor and a resident paranormal entity. 

Keep in mind if you and your business partner took different amounts out of the corporation you have invalidated your election to be taxed as an S-corp and will be considered as a C-corporation.In business you do not want to be penny wise and pound foolish.

I have discovered that investing out of state may be a option I have to consider.I love numbers and seeing how they work as I believe they do tell a story with most things.

I'm hoping success stories for this approach come pouring in.Feel free to tell me if I'm over-complicating this beast.  

I'm interested Mike, what is your story with becoming a slave to debt?!

I'm sure there's success stories of people in very unique situations who have gone big right away and made something happen, but the truth is most fail at that $70k SF house, and the failure rate on a 10 - 20 unit would be much higher. 

Whether you'll be able to collect on that judgment is a different story, but I've had about a 60% success rate of getting funds after a judgment.Be sure to follow your state landlord laws on the deduction of expenses against the security deposit. 

This doesn't mean every deal will produce the same results but I know these stories deffinitly helped me starting out and can give you confidence moving forward. 

Anyways that's a long story.