Looking for any advice, insight or strategy to launch into REI.

Was wondering mostly about the newly paid off home with equity burning a hole in my pocket already :) Better to refi for as much as I can and use the whole thing to buy and rehab a propertyPut as little as I can down and use OPM and keep the refi cash in the bank to maybe get another property. 

The percentage of people using agents to buy and sell their homes is actually higher today than it was the year before Zillow launched.

Also, if you won't be able to be on site quite a bit during the launch prep, this is probably not the best market.

Put in the effort, build relationships, prove your value, and improve your odds of finding someone to help launch you on your path.

But hold onto your hats, because despite predictions of a slowdown due to rising interest rates and market uncertainty, newly constructed homes are still as rare as a unicorn.

I trued early on in my investing to flip a property 6-6.5 hrs away by car .. it went nowhere for a couple years .. it didnt help that i was newly married also .. my wife woukd cry and then complain everytime i tried to leave to get things moving on our property miles away .. good new for me is that I bought it right and when i sold it I still made money .. enough to pay cash for the 5/4 on 2 acres here in cerntral Fl , that I am living in now .. some call it luck .. so do I ..hehehe .. 

Upon completion and rental phases, I am also close enough to be consistently present to ensure it is launched successfully.  

I want to be fair and don't want to take advantage of him but I don't think it's fair that I incur the expense of newly uncovered repairs.

When I was newly licensed, I built my business off of partnering with loan officers to teach first time home buyer classes, budgeting classes, and 1st time investor classes (I already owned rentals when I became a realtor).