<p>Research starting sophomore year is fine. Depending on where you go and what you want to do it might be very hard to impossible to get a research position as a freshman. For example, at my school it is very common for freshman to perform science and engineering reserach. I was unable to find a good econ/business research position at the begining of my sophomore year (have one now for the summer between soph and junior year). I was, however, able to get a computational biology research position for my sophomore year. At some schools and fields there are so many faculty performing research that if you email a bunch some will reply and be willing to take you on as an undergraduate researcher. At other schools and fields research is dependant on imressing a professor in a course first. Lower ranked schools might actually be better for research because some of them have special opportunities and special funding for students in their honors programs. If I wanted to stay at school to research this summer I would have to pay for everything out of pocket and would be lucky to get a stipend. For people in special honors programs they are given a stipend that covers housing.</p>