Solid income, over 800 credit, no criminal background (has law enforcement employment history).

I figure now it's time to figure out how to make some money in real estate.I'm employed full-time.

Unless you think it will appreciate big time (always a gamble but hey, we all have our methods.)

In my past 3 houses I did a buy & hold approach successfully, so I'll probably stay with that method.  

This strategy should also protect the downside a little better by offering a larger pool of buyers in the future.The way we try to claw back the cahsflow/equity is by targeting short sales or wholesale deals that may require rehab but are priced well below market value.We are not reinventing the wheel, simply implementing a tried and tested method.

A security guard is a person who is employed in various places to protect public or private properties as well as people.

Credit is great but debt to income ratio is high given my self employed status.  

Then I'd use the other methods provided by the gentleman who have answered prior to this post.

To play devil's advocate a bit, the disadvantages may be (1) keeping the integrated team busy, having enough in the pipeline to fully utilize your staff and run efficiently all the time, and (2) when the market goes south, and it will, if you employ a lot of people, it's really hard to downsize quickly enough to stay efficient.  

I am currently self employed and have always had REI in the background.