My hours are very flexible with the option to work from home, which will give me time to pursue my real estate goals.My goal with Real Estate is to accumulate enough cash flow from my rental portfolio so I can quit my job somewhere down the road to free up time so I can do something else with my life (ie. starting my own business).One of the reasons I choose real estate is because my parents purchased properties their entire lives and it has allowed them to free up their time and provide a nice semi-passive income currently owning 29 units in 5 buildings.Although I grew up observing my parents I have really just begun to get serious about real estate in the past few months.

Maybe give her a hood fan instead if you don't already have one; that would also deter her from accumulating grease buildup on your walls and ceiling, which can be a major pain to clean. 

Not only will it take forever to break even, but these examples don't take into account the accumulation of compound earnings that you are missing out on.

My duplex is near a university too, so hopefully it will continue to be in high demand as a potential exit strategy.As for my M&R, my plan was to keep $6000k aside per property for emergencies, and save 10% of rent (which is about 1.6% of the value of the property) for regular maintenance, with any leftovers accumulating for major repairs.

I'm on a steady but fairly aggressive path to accumulating a nice rental portfolio.  

I think that the partners that work so hard to accumulate large amounts of property can burn each other out and sometimes need to get away from each other to get a break from RE.

I felt like selling is not happening as quickly as I want but at the same time, I want to accumulate more rehabs while the weather is still good and we still have a few months to sell our rehab projects (before long Chicago winter comes).

You were not ready to accumulate real estate, and your strategy was flawed.  

If you want to build your net worth and build passive income, then accumulating properties that positive cash flow should be your goal.

A better way to create true passive income.The whole idea of investing in an asset is to let the hard earned money you have accumulated over the years, work for you, to let it grow for retirement,on its own, without having to invest more time and energy.