What i did was:grabbed everything i could without stealing anything, i sold it all to random vendors,sold all of the misc. stuff in the house, grabbed all of the vault stuff i could b4 leaving, raided containers(suitcases, cabnets, etc.)on my way to megaton.

if you need caps and ok with being very evil choose burks side and speech him then complete mission and you will get 1000 caps!!!!!

when you leave the vault go to the ranch house in springvale...you can ether tell help the lady(forgot her name) for 300 caps or kill her for 400 and get some chems from looting her house...you can also fix up all the leaking pipes for Walter and get 200 caps..save the 10mil from the beginning and sell it for 100 caps and the armored 101 suit for around 95 caps..and if you talk to Mr. Burke about blowing up megaton he'll tell you about Andy sthalls dads addiction to chems and if you pass a speech check he'll give you the key to the desk up in the water treatment plant...you can save the chems or sell them theres usually around 200-300 caps in there...you should have around 1000 caps now for what ever you need in the situation i usually get Jericho as a follower...since hes the second best since Fawkes...

That is what I do, WeeZer