Well for all you out there wanting to make it RE this is something to strive for.The bigger boys have moved up to light jets..

@Julian Robinson Truly to strive, timeouts must be taken.  

Even as someone who spends all day, every day thinking about BiggerPockets and constantly striving to make the community bigger and better, I still have a TON of trouble quickly explaining who and what we are to friends, family, and strangers.BiggerPockets is so huge and has so much to offer to Real Estate Investors that it sometimes seems impossible to meaningfully describe our platform to an outsider within 30 seconds or so.  

ALWAYS strive to do/be better!!

There is a sweet spot that we strive for, better than war zones in stable blue collar areas.

If you want to strive for more secure capital preservation and are willing to accept lower returns (less than 20%), you can start playing the part of equity/debt investor, and provide capital to other people's projects.I'm sure there are other options, but these are the obvious ones.

Overall, I strive to be responsive to tenant inquiries/complaints, treat my tenants fairly and with respect and so far (touch wood), I have not had problems with rent payments or property damage and all have extended their leases.

Hello friends,Jason Gilliam here, 37 y/o engineer by trade, but striving to become a full-time real estate investor at some point in the future. 

Whether you invest in real estate, bonds or equities, one should always strive for a well balanced portfolio. 

A word of caution about this though, many PHAs take a very dim view against landlords that do this on a regular basis and strive to make life difficult for them, mine included.