Is everyone else making bad investment choices or am I just being too conservative?

Just so you know - you can leave/switch brokerages pretty easily so don't worry if you make a choice and then decided to go a different route too.

I lost 60% of my property values in Tampa and they are just now showing sufficient profits to make it good enough to sell my 10 and 15 year Rentals with profits.

If after analyzing many different properties in your area you find that it is hard to reach your goal, you have several choices.1.  

We're also in CA, so for what it's worth, here's one that details our process: Becoming a Private LenderBy loaning locally in first position only, with sufficient capital you should be able to safely earn around 12% to 15% annualized.

It'd help to look up the demographics of the target area and combine that information with the types of homes being sold and use all of that information to make your choice. 2.

But there are not many good choices in this seller market, either buying REO required a lot of work, or investing out-of-state.

You have a self sufficiency test you need to do but you definitely can.One of my coworkers is from TN and does a lot down there.

In our experience (only 2 units, but over ten years) the worst of the worst tenants are those that made the choice to damage housing or not pay for housing when times got tough.

Deciding what I want to achieve: I want to learn a great deal more about real estate investing and continue to acquire rental property that will generate passive income, gaining financial independence, which will give me more freedom with my choice of day job in the future.