As the others have advised, I would strongly encourage you to buy a cash flowing multi family property (or properties) in an area you believe is likely to appreciate.Alternatively, you could keep your current primary residence and have $380k to spend, which could buy you $1.9m of real estate for investment.

Cozy is a great platform for newer investors.

I encourage everyone to dig deep and ask ALL the questions!

That said, if you are using permission based marketing, the new platform will be a bit concerned when you want to upload your data.

Obviously going to start on Airbnb and vrbo - but with the fees, and not renting short term, I was wondering if there is a better platform to use?

But, I would offer you encouragement to focus on what YOU do, or want to do best. 

.;-)  Unfortunately, greed seems to always rise atop in our society so for me, I look forward and encourage the time when wholesaling is outlawed/banned.

My first instinct was to post here and UpWork for an hourly position to start out with.I think the perfect person would be able to use content that is created, for instance a podcast interview with an Author, and recycle that into social media platforms and a monthly newsletter.

Thanks for the encouragement.

While I'm not in Illinois, I can tell you that you're in the right place searching for knowledge and professionals on this platform!