That is exciting to hear about your goal to house hack a duplex.

For STR a house is usually better.  

My main concern would be vacancy rate, since I know there is still a good amount of vacant houses in some areas. 

A SFR was built in 1947 and required renovation.The 2nd parcel, which is right next to it, is an vacant land, no address associated to it.My initial thoughts are:1.Purchase this property and rent the house after minimum required updates 2.

One of the most valuable strategies for flipping houses is using OPM (Other People's Money).

My main questions would be: how long does the entire process take from applying to actually having possible tenants to start picking from, and how do they determine exact amount for rent (the amounts listed on the housing authority site seem way higher than market rent, I’m wondering if I will actually get those numbers or not)any other general tips or advice is also appreciated!

This house was roughly 2500 sqft, but needed a little change in layout.

Hi BP family,This is my first time dealing with this issue and it was a good lesson to learn how important to buy house insurance. 

I started my real estate investing journey this year with the private purchase of a off market house that went awesome.I then found a interesting triplex/warehouse property, went and looked at it with the listing realtor, crunched the numbers and decided that it made financial sense.

i do think it's still possible for the small investor to 'invest' in CA by house hacking.