You may want to play passively as a limited partner if you are accredited and earn/learn or help out a syndicator to gain experience to see how they are doing it.  

I started the classes to earn my real-estate salespersons license this week and will be licensed by summer.

And, to earn some more money to invest! 

Karen Peake to answer your question, it has become both easier and harder.

The only reason to work without an agent as a buyer is to entice the seller's agent to take your offer... since they will earn the full commish!

So I can earn while I learn( Only want to work there untill my investments can pay me enough to quit) and further propel myself deep into the world of real estate investing.           

,Since W2 employees get taxed BEFORE they get their money, you're kind of up a tree on this one.You'd do better to find a way to pay yourself from your deals thru an S-Corp so you can control how much of it is actually salary (earned income) versus dividend (regular income).

My husband is 2 years out from University, and I earn a decent living as a recruiter in Canada.

They'll root for the underdog and hopefully will work towards earning your business.

So everything should be stacked as if you were stacking a stack of pancakes, with the syrup (rain water) hitting the top pancake (the topmost shingles at the roof peak) and running down from there.