This is a very active real estate investing group in Little Rock.

your'll over pay for junk on TV to learn from people who likely don't actively participate in real estate (they just pitch a course).

But for the average Joe, we aren’t set to inherit tons of money from our family, we tried the stock market but we’ve ended up with average 7-8% returns, maybe some of us have great ideas, but we don’t have the connections and/or the network to adequately fund our business ventures.Raising money to purchase a home is relatively easy for the vast majority of people and in some cases can be shockingly affordable.

This is how we found a vast majority of people we now work with. 

Take some time and learn the market and see what kind of activity is going on.

I also kept a real estate broker license active for about 30 years but I never did that full time.  

I'm currently still active duty military, and my goal is to get my real estate business firmly established in the next four year so that when I get out of the service I don't have to apply for jobs unless I really want to (probably not).

And this is a major repair job with lots of tedious taping and repairs before the new stucco can applied.

As far as a mentor goes, I'd recommend doing what you can to find a deal and then bringing it to someone in your area to see if they'd go in with you on it where they get majority (like 60/40) in exchange for guidance through areas that you're needing help on.

Factors like low unemployment, several major employers in the area, good rental demand might help me determine whether to purchase in a particular area.