Where Should I Start With $50,000

[Nate Elting]

Hey Bigger Pockets community!  I am looking for some advice on where to start my real estate investing career.  My name is Nate Elting, I'm 27 years old and am currently a Construction Superintendent for a large General Contractor in St. Louis.  I have ran over 100 million dollars worth of healthcare construction projects, and the projects have ranged from small $20,000 renovations to the project I'm on right now, a 36 million dollar medical office building.  I feel like I have a pretty good understanding of the construction trades at this point, and would like to start using my skills for my own investment portfolio.

Where I am at right now is I have $50,000 saved up ready to invest.  I would like to stay in Central Illinois (Peoria, IL area or maybe Edwardsville, IL) and continue to be a Superintendent while I build up my portfolio.  Eventually I would love to be a full time investor.  My main question is, what direction would you go to start?

Option 1:  Invest all 50,000 in a brand new triplex that costs $250,000.  I would be my own general contractor on the project and self perform small portions of the work myself (like flooring, cabinets and trim).  My goal would be to cashflow on this, save up another $50,000 and repeat the same processing building another one.  

Option 2 - Buy 3 single family homes at around 100,000 each.  I would try to identify 3 homes that need very little work, and start cash flowing on them almost immediately.

Option 3 - Perform a BRRRR method strategy.  - This option in my mind would take the longest to start cash flowing, but I'm definitely not opposed to doing it.  I would want to identify some ran down houses in the local area with some large upside, be my own general contractor,  renovate them, refinance after I get in rented, and repeat with the profit.  I wouldn't be throwing all my eggs in one basket with this option I feel, because I would one buy 1 house to start, and hold back some of my original $50,000 for future bigger opportunities.

Option 4 - Open to other suggestions!