Flipping houses vs rental appartments, which is more profitable?

[Lukas Chen]

Hello, pardon my ignorance but as you can read in the title, which is more profitable? Might be a stupid question. 

I've seen people talk about rentals and it seems like that is so risky and only slightly profitable due to maintenance costs and vacancy and stuff.

Flipping houses seems like a much safer bet with bigger gains judging from the success stories.

Again this is probably a stupid question with alot of missing variables. I have absolutely no knowledge in this field yet but I wish to learn more.

[Jason Hawk]

Lukas, the short boring answer is there is good to both.  It's my belief if you only have a couple rentals it can be more risky should you have a bad tenant, or major problem with the property.  My comfort zone for renting properties is atleast five, this way if you do have a bad tenant of need major work done on the property, your other properties help offset the financial burden.  Obviously you have to work up to the point of getting five properties, which can take time but once you get there it's much more comfortable.  Feel free to message me back with any further questions. 

Jason