I think going back to high tech and make good salary is a sensible approach. At this time, you need cash to accumulate more properties. Many investors are part time, they make good salaries. Because unless you are a full time real estate agent, you really don’t need to devote 100% time to real estate. You can manage all your 4 houses on a part time basis. Assuming you have all of them rented out on a long term lease, you actually have very little to do during the day. General rule of thumb is you don’t quit your job before accumulating 12 houses. Investing in real estate is to get passive income. I am sure right now your passive income from cash flow is not good enough yet.

I understand your emotion attachment to BA. You like to own a house there even if the cash flow may not sound great. I am not sure about your 4 unit house there, maybe the cash flow is better than one unit house. But still, I assume the cash flow in Bay area won’t be as great as Austin if you use the same 1 million dollar to buy 5 or 6 houses in Austin. You need to do a detailed calculation to compare the two different location. As investor, you don’t get emotional attached to your properties. Regardless it’s in BA or Austin, if the house doesn’t perform, then it’s not a great investment. Performance means that the rental income is high enough to cover the mortgage payment.

Remote management is not recommended for its pain on investors. You will be burned out over the long term so that may prevents you from comfortably holding it for the long term. I would generally confine my properties within 2-3 hours drive. No more than that.

While in Austin, you would need to check www.ofheo.gov site’s annual appreciation rate over the past many decades to correct predict the future. If Austin can maintain a 4% average annual rate, then owning 10 houses over the long can be just as profitable as you would be if you stay in Bay area.