My wife and I talk all the time about what we would do different had we jumped into real estate prior to purchasing a primary residence and we come back to house hacking pretty much every time as a way we could have accelerated our wealth faster (especially as we were living like college students in our first few years in Charlotte anyway).People have offered very good book recommendations and I would recommend delving into FI (financial independence) if you haven’t yet.

While your concerns are justified by these statistics, this flood to the market is really just a market correction.  

(In other words it’s my job to make sure everyone gets in and out of the deal with money in their pockets and not in “unexpected mishaps.” cause if ya get the #s right in the first place there shouldn’t be any reason for something to take ya off track) Although you mention having experience is a leg up, but as a man who works as a welder fabricator/ plumber I obviously have none other than the research I’ve been doing independently for the last 6 months.

It's just how interest rates work - if it's your own house that you lay your kid's heads down in, you're statistically less likely to default.

Little money out of pocket and a repeatable strategy to financial independence.

Be sure to get an independent inspection of all systems.

https://www.census.gov/data/ta... and https://www.census.gov/data.ht... .Also, try the Bureau of Labor Statistics https://www.bls.gov/

A tenant with a shorter stay usually expects a full deposit  a tenant for 3 years usually doesn’t (from my statistically insignificant experience!). 

We focus on the suburbs of Independence, Raytown, South Kansas City and Grandview but you need to know the individual neighborhoods in these areas.

If you're wanting to be financially independent, ask yourself how much $500 moves the needle for you.