Living in California, many are exciting about business ventures in the industry, but many are also holding their cards to see where everything falls given the recent presidential election.

All I can say is that on speculative ventures I expect to be compensated at a reasonable rate in comparison to the risk involved.Now, if I knew you and we had done a lot of successful deals together, I would probably do it for much less.

I would like to find someone who has experience finding/ analyzing deals that I could joint venture with,of course I would Fund in exchange for what I would be learning.

I do need to start proving my income so I can use these funds for my future ventures.

That isn't right.I'm going to venture to guess that someone isn't doing the math right OR that you lied to the IRS about your rental income when you did your taxes.If you lied, tsk tsk.If you were honest when you filed your taxes, meaning we think the math is being done improperly, go find a REI friendly lender local to you.

Wish you all the best on your real estate ventures!

You'll want some money in the bank for a rainy day so you may want to buy less home.You could joint venture with a bigger investor on multi unit deals.  

I agree with @Ben M. that you may want to try investing at home first before venturing into other markets, just so you can get your feet wet and build confidence.I would also suggest that before you look for properties out of state, find Property management companies in the states you are interested in first. 

In Columbus, we have a ton of resources like the Small Business Development Center, lots of co-working spaces, a monthly new venture pitch / networking called "wakeup startup", Columbus Young Professionals (CYP), a number of networking groups, etc.

Good luck on all your future REI ventures and remember to take action!