It's always great to see more folks with a strong REI background.I hope that our site can help you with all of your real estate investing goals - we've got a ton of real estate investing resources here!

It's always great to see more folks with a strong REI background.

From what I can see from the windows it seems the bank has kept the utilities and AC on, and aside from a carpet cleaning and some paint it is pretty clean.All that being said I'm am thinking of picking it up to rent for a few years, then I'll upgrade the kitchen and flooring and move into it, and rent my current home, or sell it depending on how strong the market is and move on to the next investment.Problem is that while I have awesome credit (820+) and work history, I only have maybe 5k cash I can use for the property, the rest needs to be mortgaged.

I recommend going to LoopNet.comSearch for properties in areas that you want to invest in and see what Realtors have lisitngs and or a presence on the site.You should be able to find a bunch that are actually doing business that wayGood Luck!

The best way to secure a private lender is to have a Solid Executive Summary for You and Your CompanyYou need a strong Board of Directors, and a good list of previous projects you've completed.Imagine if you were a Private Money Lender, and someone came to you with a deal...

A city like Houston would likely swing back around in due time because of its strong medical, education, labor, import / export shipping ports, technology, etc.Hopefully someone with experience can chime in on this. :)

The reason for this is it increases your touches (we all know it takes multiple touches before a customer "acknowledges" your presence in most cases) without increasing your costs.  

The Austin Area is strong right now 

I see your hesitation, I think that in this strong rental market we are experiencing in Denver right now it would make this an ok deal, in a softer rental market this would probably suck to own. 1/1 is going to have more turnover than a 2 bed, more turnovers ultimatey equals less profit.

With units the competition is so strong and the caps are so low that you are an interest rate increase away from losing money on a highly leveraged property.