A few months later, an out-of-state bank wanted in on the market and offered a special "lifestyle loan" program to those with a solid income who could afford the monthly payments (it ignored debt-to-income ratios).

I've been inspired by listening to BP podcast #311 with J Scott on how to prepare for the pending market correction.

@Ray LiIt's advisable to engage a tax CPA/EA if you aren't comfortable with the tax preparation process. 

I have heard a lot of posts about how to buy real estate with no money down, low down, first time buyer program, etc.

Currently they haven't rolled the program out here but when they do, I'll be applying. 

While preparing to for their first purchase they spend all of their time worrying about running numbers, which in my opinion is easy to do once you find a system that works, and they do not spend enough time researching the tenant/property management aspects of a potential deal which are a lot more intricate than running numbers in almost all cases. 

Those little things can save you a lot of headache later on.As much as I hate to say this, you should be prepared to do significant repairs and/or junk removal from the property once you get the tenant out.

The difference between those programs is that MI can be dropped on the Freddie without refinancing. 

FHA is the only program that will not allow rental income from departure residence to be used if is within 100 miles radius from your new purchase 

I’m in a repayment program which allows me to pay 10% of my AGI per year for 20 years (10 years if i work in an eligible 5013c nonprofit company) and then the loan is forgiven.