Or does it purely my choice of whether I want cash flow or equity build? 

Approach this from a purely appreciation and not cash flow standpoint.

If you're purely only interested in Cashflow - look into Cleveland.

The tax exemption benefits are useless to most of us foreign buyers and a pure marketing tool used by the local developers.

At what point can you go to pure self employment from other sources of income?

Let's say you DO try to do Real Estate as a "pure investment".

Hi Doraine,If you look at a pure investment, I’m not sure it’s gonna be profitable.

Is this arrangement purely tagging onto Tom's reputation? 

I don’t have kids, but I grew up at least in retrospect pretty well off as did both my parents, I am one of the least entitled people I know as are both my parents, that’s attributable to a few things imo, one is just pure personality, I know some people that grew up dirt poor and are extremely entitled and other people that are crazy rich and you’d never know, some of that is just random luck, but I think another key is while we’ve always have had the security that comes with being pretty well off, we’ve going back generations lived below your means, my mom grew up in westchester county New York which is a crazy rich place, my grandmother intentionally moved my mom to a frankly pretty mixed income school district so she didn’t become spoiled, I grew up until I was 13 in a very middle class neighborhood, went to middle class schools, hell my mom up until literally this week drove a 13 year old ford explorer with 155k miles.

I'd strongly recommend seeking out other purely passive accredited investors and focus on building real relationships.