You lost me when you mentioned the “substitution for collateral”.

Like @David Gran mentioned, you can get two homes with the VA loan; I did exactly that (still have two houses with the VA loan).   

Here are some recommended resources (not paid for mentioning anything in this post:)Personal FinanceI strongly suggest learning as much as possible about personal finance (if you haven’t already) as I believe strong personal finances is the foundation for a strong real estate portfolio.

The issue he has mentioned with his properties is vacancy including one that has been vacant for 2 years because he was doing the rehab himself and him having poor tenants.

Hopefully the other projects mentioned in this plan can be implemented.

Something that's not mentioned on this forum much though- watch out for midwestern markets that cash flow well w/ respect to price:rent ratio, but have an excess of rental housing supply relative to the tenant pool.

I would disagree with you only because the 84 unit development I mentioned above is doing just that.

Of course, this is in addition to everything else that everyone has mentioned. 

She just kind of mentioned it out of the blue without any call to action, which triggered my initial post. 

She never mentioned any late rent until May 2018.