Hi everyone. I'm a mother passing along some information for my son, Blake, because he isn't able to participate in the BiggerPockets community himself right now.

Blake is currently incarcerated in Texas following a tragic DWI accident that resulted in the death of a friend. He is taking responsibility for what happened and wants to use his time to learn and prepare for when he gets out.

He is working on his MBA in Business Management through Adams State University and has gotten really interested in real estate investing. He's been reading BiggerPockets books and other real estate books and is trying to learn as much as he can.

His goal is to eventually own rental properties.

I wanted to ask the people on here who have been doing this for a while:

If you were starting over, what would you spend your time learning before buying your first rental property?

What do you wish you had known before buying your first property?

What skills should he be working on now?

Are there any books, or other resources you would recommend?

How did you meet and build relationships with other investors when you were first getting started?

He's not looking for money or asking anyone to invest with him. He just wants to learn as much as he can now so he isn't starting from scratch when he gets the chance to invest.

If you've been doing this for a while, we'd really appreciate any advice you have. I'll be passing the responses along to him.

Thanks everyone.