Heres what i did, and i could have took the long way and i havent had any deals yet but ill break down my trial and error and the method i feel will work best for me.first, i searched zillow for homes that are selling for low cost, found the owners and mailed yellow letters of course-the problem with this is, a lot of these homes still have loans on them and probably bank owned already, the owner still lives there, theres already a realtor on the job, just way too many obstacles, i dont expect to get any calls from those letters but you have to start somewhere.next, i started searching on auction sites for homes that did not go up for auction yet or the auction expired-again, the problem with this is the homes are 9/10 bank owned. while some of them are foreclosures theres still extra loops to jump through.I considered buying lists of vacant homes and stuff but i am the most frugal person you will ever meet lol, its not that i cant afford to buy a list, its just that i know theres a different way and plus whoever made those list had to have someone else generating that list for them.

I left my FT job and needed (fairly) quick income.

I don't think I'll make this months as I'll be on travel for my day job but I'll look for others to attend.

We typically buy C class stuff, and I constantly hear discussions about how C class won't be affected by all the new construction, because "they're not building anymore of those," or "where do you think everyone has to move when jobs go away," and any number of other conversations.  

I want to pay for my education, not through GURU's but through on-the-job experience.  

If you have an area where labor is plenty and job is scarce, you are more likely to get it at 50/sf, but I wouldn't exchange that much headache (a year?)

For example, if the property costs $100,000 and you have $50,000 of personal funds, you could invest in the property under a tenants in common whereby your retirement account puts up $50,000 and you personally put up the other $50,000.

I'd recommend reading through The Ultimate Beginner's Guide for an overview on the common strategies used in REI. 

I know how these things go.So think about it  fully rehabbed 40k home.. that home has to be bought for 5 to 10k  because if you want a home that is rehabbed it needs at least 15 to 25k of work done to it .. so it does not eat you up in cap ex.. so lets say the company wants to make 10k  ( pretty common for house flippers) so the most they can be in the home is 30k  so you are buying the lowest of the low at wholesale values the worse of the worse areas.. and on the face these do not equate into long term steady cash flow vehicles. they just don't  they only are sold to those to new or naive to understand this won't work long term....

Great job, just be sure to screen those tenants well....