Phases/Stages of REI?

[Lindsay Wilcox]

It kind of seems like there's a standard progression through different phases or atages of REI.

Newbies are more likely to live in one unit of a MF home and rent out the other two while looking for wholesale deals.

The second-stagers buy and flip or rent mostly SF or small MF homes, but they probably live in a home they bought fairly inexpensively and made a moderate number of repairs to and aren't wholesaling much.

Then people looking for big money buy a couple large multi-unit apartment buildings because they can afford them and have built the management chops.

And finally people back down and start funding other investors who need capital to get started and aren't as invested in actual property anymore--or if they are, they just have a great manager and never actively touch the deals. They just manage a team.

Does that seem accurate to people who have been around awhile? I'm just getting started, but it seems like a trend I've noticed. Some people atay in any one of those phases, but in general, it seems like people progress.