sorry to hear that.
I'd say it would be slighty different from here to the US so I can't speak on that. However, here we have many viable options for investment properties. Such as negative gearing. Meaning if you take out a loan for say 800k, you can just pay the interest for say 5 years and with our taxation system after 5 years you have not paid a cent of your own money, yet the value of the property has increased and if you sold it you would make a profit. I think Canada has a similar system to this. here for more info
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_gearing_(Australia)
The purpose of this, if you are a first investment home buyer, is to basically show the bank you can manage the loan so therefore on the next one they will give you alot more, and so forth.. Safe way but more for the long term.