Financial Independence and Expat Living

[Account Closed]

I have an autoimmune disease in my colon that is triggered by stress.  When it is active it makes my life miserable.  The biggest cause of stress is working as a construction project manager in NYC with a lot of pressures coming from all sides.  The biggest stress relief for me would be to know I could walk away from work at any time without having to worry about money.  I don't know if I would quit a job that I do well at, am appreciated, work with a great team, and enjoy most days.  But having a safety net, a plan B would go a long way for peace of mind and physical health even if I never quit what I'm doing.

So I am trying to reach a basic level of FI as soon as possible.  Through research and travel, what I realized is there are many areas in the world that I would be open to living that are much cheaper than NYC or much of America.  On even $1,200/month I could live very comfortably in areas such as Bali, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines.  For stocks using the 4% rule in low cost index funds, I would need $360,000 invested to make that $1,200/month expat plan happen.  I'm 26 and at my current income and savings rate I'll have that money by age 35.  If I get raises in line with what my coworkers have gotten while maintaining the same expenses, I can expect to have the money by age 32, just 6 years away.  

My question for the Bigger Pockets community is to lay out a scenario with real estate of how I could get there faster.  I am saving $30,000/year and don't want to invest anything I already have in real estate because that is my emergency fund.  How many doors and how much invested in down-payments and up front costs is a reasonable middle of the road assumption to make a $1,200/month profit on real estate?