Exactly.And I believe it'll continue to trend down.

A lot of people bought thinking it would continue to grow and prosper. 

When companies or properties are not self sustaining, you would initiate an "owner contribution" to cover any expense the business/rental property could not cover. 

For others that prefer your company or mine to work for them.

Throw an LLC together with a few people with $1m each, and buy it, San Francisco isn't short of folks who got lucky with this or that IPO and have the money, most of those tech companies have an unofficial employee-maintained slack/discord channel where they talk about real estate stuff.

I am an engineer with a full time job, but plan on continuing to purchase rent ready properties to slowly build wealth.

Just a tip: make sure you go into it with an experienced brokerage who really know their way around.I’ve personally been helping international investors get into the Dubai scene and work with experienced local companies that handle everything from start to finish. 

So, if you are talking about truly early journey, it was working for other people's companies who were where I wanted to be.  

I'm all about equity and I think it is OK to not have cash flow, but you need to have a plan to continue paying the mortgage if things get tough.

Also, there are PM companies that charge a flat fee vs percentage.