My own cash, local community banks, & hard money.

It must make money to justify the effort.  

Ill be doing so with my brother, we both make good money and wanted to find a way to put it to work.

I would say that my advice will greatly depend on your goals and what resources you have to invest with (time, money, skills). 

My plan at the moment is to live at uncles house to save money, finalize things I need to do in my location and find an apartment that has a short term lease of 6 months in Dallas.

I spent a good amount of money and never got a single deal.

Quote from @Basit Siddiqi: Investing in Oil and Gas is somewhat of a gamble.The way that I see oil and gas investments have one of two likely outcomesA) Lose all or close to all your moneyB) Get 10X your investmentTo answer your question you can potentially do a roth conversion and offset it with oil and gas investments.In doing a Roth Conversion the tax due is lost money when paid.  

I've been told my breaking even was costing me money.

If you've got the deal expertise, a money partner would bring the funds for you to close deals.If you've got your own money, an experienced operator would help you source and underwrite deals.

Putting 20-25% down can help save you some money on your rate allowing for a little better pricing.