Darin I was in the same position as you but I have a couple of comments for you. First if you want to get started being a real estate investor remember that until you buy real estate you are not a real estate investor you are a seminar taker. So to take action you would have had to buy some real estate not take a class.
Second is that real estate agents don’t know how real estate makes money. They see it as a job. It is like you wanting to make sure you get nutrients out of food so you ask a fry cook at McDonalds how the digestion system works. Also a fact of life is that real ease agents by and large don’t believe in real estate. What they see every day is people that have bought property badly coming into their office saying that they have lost their shirts and are bleeding cash and need to get out now. They never see the guy that is happy with his deal and is making money. So they get reinforced over and over how bad real estate is and over time unconsciously develop a bias for thinking that real estate is bad.
Steven Covey said we are all born somewhere we will call that Hilton Head. We all want to go to health, wealth, joy, and happiness. We will call that Disneyworld. From the time we could walk people have been telling us how to get to Disneyworld. We were first taught by our parents then teachers and professors and then by our bosses. These people use referral past experience to tell us how to get to Disneyworld. But look at them. Are any of them in the financial place you want to be in? Are they in Disneyworld? I suggest they are not. Don’t talk to anybody about how to get to Disneyworld except for people in Disneyworld.
If following the path laid out in the normal course of life would get you to Disneyworld then more people would be there. Find somebody that is doing what you want to do and imitate them. You will find that the people that design these courses can teach you how to get rich selling courses but it is not clear if they can tell you how to get rich in real estate (although these courses are good for information).