Grad Student need career advice

[Jim Hoang]

My name is Jim, 24, from Oakland, CA. I am a MBA student entering my second year and pursing a career in Commercial Real Estate either as a Analyst or Broker. I am pursing this path because I enjoy working with people/teams, the nature of the work (risk/return), and results (project/$/ A to Z). After graduation, I will have 80k in student loan shackle to my ankles. These past few months I've been thinking about the possible paths I can take after graduation which is a) enter the corporate world/work with a small developer firm or b) begin my path in the REI. I am trying to weigh out my options. Would love to hear your thoughts. It's quite a long post, I want to thank you in advance for your time.

Option A: The plus side would be I'm able to payoff my loans, learn more about this industry, network, and build capital. The down side is I will have to start looking for internships or part-time gigs to gain the relevant experience and knowledge. And, this is what I am having trouble with. I don't know who to talk to, where to start looking, and how approach it. I applied to a few CRE firms and I've gotten interviews but no offers.

Option B: Not much of a angle here. I have shadowed a local investor in looking for rehab properties, participated in auctions by the court steps, getting my hands dirty renovating the properties, staging for open houses, hosting open house, and signing loan docs (i'm a notary). I've done about 10 flips with this guy, all for free. The down side is I have no capital saved for investing and the loans will bug me. I am living at home with my parents and will have to pay rent after I graduate.

Personal Finance:

-Credit Score in the high 700's

-Only debt is student loans. I pay cash for everything.

-I run a eCommerce business that generates about 2k/month cash-flow (the profit goes to my Emergency Fund account, I opened this account)

*I've been reading alot about both Residential and Commercial RE Books. I bought a couple of online courses on RE modeling.

Goal: My 5 year goal is to payoff this debt, network, learn, and build capital for investing. My 5+ year goal is to have financial freedom through buy and hold Quad-plex, flipping single-family homes, and condo conversions.  By age 35, I want to have a net worth of $5 million and $10,000 in passive income. 

[Curt Davis]

Do both options at the same time.  Might as well get aggressive as you have a lot of student loan debt but have also got your hands dirty doing some real estate as well.  

Better do it fast while your still single and no family to worry about.