What I did was buy a single family home in the worst neighborhood you would feel comfortable moving your wife and kids to within 15 minutes of your home.

The sooner you start, the sooner you will feel more comfortable with the idea of investing in a property. 

Everyone has different comfort levels with their money, you should do what makes you comfortable.  

@Matan ParetMatan,As a fellow physician and real estate investor I was in your shoes 10+ years ago. 

If you weren't comfortable going the turnkey route then you could partner with an investor friendly agent who should have teams in place to make the investment passive for you as well. 

You are the one investing your money, and you should feel comfortable with the property before committing the non-refundable EMD.

If you're comfortable with a long-term horizon, both real estate and stocks can be excellent vehicles for wealth growth.Active vs.

It all depends what your comfortable with.

They took a lot of risks that I wouldn't do, like liquidating much of their savings to buy property or used a lot more leverage than I would be comfortable with.

If no construction lender can get comfortable with you as the builder (aka principal, sponsor) regardless of you hiring a well-qualified GC, then maybe the solution is to give some piece of the equity to another builder/principal who would oversee the GC, and whom has the track record to satisfy the lender.