The friendship or the money because at one point you may have to make a choice. 

I used to be the featured speaker at a national workshop/school, where we presented PWF's as a great energy efficient alternative to concrete.  

KyleWelcome to BP Kyle,Great choice of markets and you have a head start as you come from the area.Columbus has lots going for it.

It may or may not be your best choice for a job.But the underlying thought is the answer to your question about cash - find a job (maybe you already have one), and spend less than you make and accumulate the rest until you have enough to start buying properties.

Just make sure to analyze and make sure you make smart choices.

Each course has many topics, and each topic has it's section of reading that ends with a 10 question multiple choice quiz that you must pass in order to move on.

But nothing has been clear about "using my equity".The choices I can see are:1)Sell one TX house, 1031 the proceeds into 1/2 the price of 2 different houses and apply for 2 different loans.

I am not experienced like many of the members here but just from what I have researched it sounds as if a better option would be to spend your time looking for funding using alternative or non-traditional options.  

I think it's more helpful to be able to articulate your high-level choice first, and only then worry about the specific implementation decisions of that plan.

Alternatively, I also have a retired friend who’s looking for a stable return of 5% on his retirement funds.