Maximum leverage and deters bad tenants from applying when they know how easy it is to get rid of them.

Your ultimate goal is to achieve maximum leverage and be owed enough money to justify taking her to small claims court.

And in your case where you have some money in the bank already I think you'd be better off leveraging the cheap mortgage interest rates at present, and then earning a better return on the cash you don't put down.  

Hello,I'm new to BiggerPockets but have found it very educating thus far as I get started in the REI world. 

It is mostly bilingual education.

That's great about wanting to give your kid an education in non-traditional earnings. 

What leverage do I need?

Leveraging all your properties to the hilt worked back in the day when lenders would go 90% or even 100% or higher LTVs on investment property.  

Others (such as myself) buy property with the highest amount of leverage possible and would care more about cash flow.

So if you have like $80k in debt and $140k in equity, you can use the equity to put down payments on two ~$100k props and even buy a third outright if you'd prefer not to be completely leveraged (you'd still end up with more debt than you currently have, maybe $160k instead of my $80k assumption).