Should I attempt to pay off more of my debt before I attempt to purchase something? 

If you simply include water and garbage in your monthly rent they will not pay any attention to how much they waste.Once I made the transition it saved me several hundred dollars a year per unit.

Showing on time is not important, if you make it early, you'll have more networking time, that's all.Do not assume that a REIA (or in our case simply a networking group) focuses solely on the geography in which it is located. 

Here is California, if you form an LLC the State Franchise Tax board requires an annual $800 tax simply for existing, albeit if one is in business, one can expects expenses.

Are you buying a deed to the property, or are you simply paying the taxes and getting a tax lien certificate?

You are simply an interested investor.  

It includes a role playing transaction between Will and I that we tried off the cuff about 5 years ago and bombed big time....LOLOther than that, you can now have live chat on the Principals of RE, investor transactions and Notes for only $29.94 simply by sending me your debit/credit card number for the Biggerpockets Chat Education Class

I have implemented both philosophies simply by going through the debt snowball in my personal finances but using leverage(debt, or others people's money) for investments. 

I suggest you make contacts simply by talking about what you might do, such as I'm interested in being a private lender, what do I need to do?

Well, in regard to the repairs and such, I'd simply forfeit the idea that you need to make repairs such as a hole kicked in a wall by your tenant's kid for $25, and realize that whatever it takes to repair it, it doesn't matter since you would be passing the cost on to your tenant.