First you should decide if you are going to stay where you are going to own for a looooong time. I had a condo in Oceanside, but moved to Chicago for Midway. Like Justin said "This isn't the most stable of industries". Even if you could find someone to rent if you had to move, dealing with renters is a bitch. I'm done…
Own a few, but I'm not in the industry (yet...there's always hope). They've all been HUD repos that I bought for almost nothing, and I live in the southern US, where housing prices are rock bottom compared to the rest of the US and the world (paid ~$60k US for the one I'm in now). The upside is they're cheap to get in and…