However, I am struggling to formulate my plan for financial independence and feel like I need to seek out some outside view points and opinions….

We took a week vacation over July 4th and then I jumped into investing again.MY GOALSMy long-term goals are to achieve financial independence from cash flow rentals in multiple cities.

Despite this risk, an investor should be able to refinance the relinquished or replacement properties and get tax free cash, as long as he establishes that the refinance had "independent economic substance."

I look forward to building meaningful relationships with you all, my fellow BP members, as I embark upon my journey towards financial independence and mutual cooperation!

Part of my plan (my WHY) for early financial independence is so I can be personally, physically available to help them out when they get older without having to worry about only having X-days of vacation each year. 

Phenomenal book that really explains the concept of Financial Independence.2.

@Rylan RockThanks for the feedback and I reallyAppreciate it..Do you need to work for a brokerage company or anything once you get your real estate license or can I work independently?

My wife and I keep going back and forth on the topic and I thought I'd ask you guys for some outside opinions.Here's our situation:- No kids (neither of us want any either)- Both of us are under 30 (not for long)- We save $2k/mo and that's after paying rent of $1,500, it comes out to be $28,000/year of savings with 26 paychecks each/year- More about savings: we save roughly 43% of our income and that's without being Nazis- I have roughly $30k in my own savings from stock trading that I'm currently looking to re-locate into real-estate.So here's our plan: We recently sat down and came up with a 5-10 year plan of acquiring out of state rentals (we live in California) to become financially independent with cash-flow.

I hit my financial independence number when I was in my 20's BUT I still work full-time as well as build the Property Management business. 

The last few mortgage companies I was with, prior to going independent, VA borrowers paid for their own appraisal upfront just like everyone else, and it had never occurred to me that it could be any different.