Since you're just starting out, unless you have a lot of seed money, I think the most efficient way to make money would be to focus on marketing activities.

If you blame yourself too hard, it could turn into self loathing and that may prevent you from being willing to take risk in your next opportunity.Your tolerance for risk ought to be enhanced, not reduced.Any kind of a problem that can be fixed with a check is not really a problem.In every problem lies the seed for an equal or greater opportunity.

I'm just looking for creative ways to conserve seed capital while trying to avoid pitfalls in the process.I'll just come out and state the obvious...  

The landscaping was hard to judge because of the snow at the start of the project, so I budgeted $2,500 for quick sprucing up, but ended being $6,000 because of all the dead patches and the need for re-seeding. 

I've recently found a job that has and will provide me with seed money and am now beginning to look for my second property.  

It's exhausting and totally time consuming, but your planting your seeds now to bear fruit for you next Spring.  

I only have 2 purchases per year in my plan, but freeing up the seed capital quickly would enable me to buy the second property if it came along soon after the first for that year. 

If you cant boast of at least 50% of this as your own seed money, looks like you are building a castle in the sky!

Given the amount of land needed, I would like to make the most of the extra land and add value to the overall project, as well as the seed investors.

Buy/rehab a property, refinance all your cash back out, and keep repeating this until you get tired of it.2 Golden Rules of REI I follow:Rule #1`:  Never under any circumstances spend your seed money...use it over and over again.