I have about 50k for down and was planning to put 25% as suggested  by my mortgage broker to make e deal as smooth as possible.

Events like Black Diamond are good for connecting with wholesalers, and sometimes off-market deals are promoted at the events. 

(Don't Subordinate)  @Bob E.

Guess I forgot to add angry and defensive in my typical back the guru promoter profile.  

They promote education programs from their experts, at a price.

That said, here are a few tips that may help with your decision.You can typically cash out your investments at any time, and lock in the current value, even in an existing plan.You could rollover the existing plan to either a plain old IRA (E*trade, a bank, etc) or a self directed IRA while you have access and consider your options with non-traditional assets in a self directed plan in the future.Within a self directed IRA, you have the ability to invest in traditional assets, so money does not need to remain idle.The type of self directed plan you would pursue is the big question.  

s=real+e...In a nutshell, you don't NEED a RE license to be successful, but there are benefits to having one.

I want to see people turning their lawns into food and my way of promoting this is investing to help people homestead on rentals.

A facilitator of a transaction is always just the facilitator, there are long established fees and charges adopted for facilitating any transaction, that is what brokers do.In the military we say people are promoted to their level of incompetence.

How do we e-shake on it?