My research shows that the typical deposit size needs to be in excess of 40 % and access to low/no money down deals is heavily restricted.

Building wealth by buying gold and going heavily into "good debt" might also work, but in the wrong market, it could be a disaster.

I just happen to be fortunate enough to be able to do both things, max 401K and invest heavily in long term buy & hold real estate. 

Anchoring is a well-documented cognitive bias that describes the human tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information offered (the "anchor") when making decisions.

I do not know about the states mentioned but in many other states for strong suburban or urban core trailers or whatever you want to call them are heavily frowned upon.The renters tend to be transient in nature a lot times.

We are investing in Central KY where smoking is unfortunately heavily common, most of the houses that we visited before buying all had smoking inside.

I think that investing heavily in real estate is a great strategy, whether it be passively or not. 85%+ of my net worth is wrapped up into real estate, so I have no issue with your strategy. 

., Ha ha, probably I would've made better decisions if I had drank some. 

Which has it's downside but also it's upsides as they rely heavily on us to make money.

I was just in Princeville and I had heard that STR was mostly illegal on the north shore of Kauai though also not heavily enforced though enforcement could get stricter