Your Core 4 Real Estate team will play a very important role in your success.As for other markets to check out, it really comes down to what you're aiming for. 

I want to find out if real estate investment can get us there.

Once you have stabilized your primary residence and rental properties, consider additional real estate investments using the equity you build.I hope this helps!

Still working on timing my transition from stocks to real estate.

I am new to real estate investing but am interested in fix and flip projects and building a rental portfolio.

We have been learning about real estate investing since Aug 2015.

@Doug Webb for commercial class residential (5+) units, the general guidance you'll get is that you should be taking possession via an LLC, as there are no real advantages to not doing so besides the minor overhead of forming and maintaining the entity.

Quote from @Michael Dallas: Real wealth is built by holding onto property.

Real estate prices and construction costs vary significantly by location, thus, it could make sense depending on the market your planning on building in. 

So you can't just get a pre-approval for all properties like in residential real estate, but a pre-approval for the exact property you are going to make an offer on (Is that correct)?