I did find one bank that would refinance to a 15-year loan at a good rate, but that would involve throwing a lot of cash into principal to get the payment down to the point it keeps cashflowing strongly.I've only ever bought two places, this rental and the one I'm in now, but I had considered buying a 3rd place in DC before my next overseas stint. 

I'm currently involved in one right now. 

Could another cabinet of drawers fit in there? 

I'm pretty new to it myself, still figuring out how it works, which part of it I want to be involved with...I know one suggestion I hear a lot about is going to Real Estate Investment meetings/ Associations.

Are you involved i.e. what is your sphere of influence?

The whole "My wife loves this area and the house is a great fit for us".

Even with a third-party involved, options that are functionally contract assignments ($100 option to buy some third party's property) are unlikely to survive scrutiny. 

How does RE fit into them?

Outside of work, I’m an avid traveler that has visited 54 countries (and love hearing travel tips), a martial arts fan with black belts in two martial arts, and I read a book every week (and always love good reading suggestions).How did I get involved with real estate?

@Joshua Dorkin, @Brandon Turner, @Dave Van Horn, @Mindy Jensen,  and whoever else at BP is involved in publishing -- Amazon.com offers a fantastic service called WhisperSync that coordinates the Kindle ebook with the Audible audio edition of the same book.