We use combined income and average credit score for approval. 

I've seen people here get rental deals done for under 100K, purchase price and repair cost combined.

I would need to finance these properties with a combination of FHA and Hard money loans (employing a BRRR)3) I would like to start with 1 property a year, eventually moving up to 2-3Two questions: Where do I go from here?

I would be using a combination of my own personal capital along with the HELOC loan from my Mom.I have found a lender that will give my Mom a 1.49% interest rate (locked in) for the first 12 months then prime rate after that.

@TJ Flynn Since you seem to have contractor skills you could probably start with a live in flip, maybe combined with house hacking.

This is super local, though.A bit more for CapEx and repairs. 15% combined to be safe.You've left out Management (10%).

Look into that if your area will support such.Towns such as you describe would benefit from a coin op laundry, perhaps combining the two.

Higher mortgage rates aren’t helping either.Both combined to cause a 17.9% drop in mortgage applications last week compared with the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s seasonally adjusted index.

But post 2008 crisis, the combination of low interest rates, low unemployment, high property appreciation, proliferation of syndicates, YouTube videos touting RE riches and more chatter around blogs, RE sites etc, all of that had made RE investing a lot more popular among various tranches of the middle class.

Hi Ron, house hacking and BRRR are the two best strategies when you start out - and they actually combine very well.