IMN conferences. 

Appreciate your input.Oh ya, FYI I live in Eastern Washington State.

I'm trying to get involved in real estate and currently renting right now I live in the eastern part of lancaster county Pa. 

Networks could be: local builders exchange, local and regional homebuilders association, search on websites for NAHB, NMHC, ULI, attend real estate meet-ups, attend real estate conferences.

We’ve been investing in the eastern suburbs for quite some time.

@Cole Hopkins if you want to confer with a local attorney regarding non-conforming use, I would recommend Mark Weeks or Robbie Irvine (North Charleston), John Q.

So within a week I was sitting in a hotel conference room with about 300 other people and about $5K less in my wallet.

We have used them as our back-end reporting layer for 10 years.You would also be wise to confer with a tax attorney.  

If I were there, I would have struck up a conversation with the seller and worked some questions into the flow of the conversation that would clarify if the seller is open to creative acquisition strategies (I would have told the agent that I was going to talk to the seller if the conversation didn't just initiate naturally...don't surprise the agent).If you want to talk to the seller now, after you've left the property, you should go to your agent and ask if she'd be willing to ask the seller if she would participate in a conference call.  

Be active in the forums and you will learn a ton and meet lots of great contacts.There is a pretty big group of MA locals here so try to seek them out and set up your keywords to get pointed to local threads and other topics of interest.In addition to the meetup that Adam mentioned you can also check out the South Shore REIA on the Cape and the Eastern MA REIA has 2 meetings in Rockland and Taunton.