I don't expect to know everything by then, but I hope to develop a basic strategy that prevents me from making the most common and costly mistakes that a newbie can make.

Hello, I am new to real estate and looking to get into it and out of renting and starting to work on building that generational wealth. I am a self employed residential general contractor. This year we cleared about $...

If you are a newbie or old timer who is really struggling to break through in this business, what do you think is the reason so many don't make it?

Given that I am a complete newbie...what would you suggest? 

I focus heavily on the sell side and on the buy side only work with high net worth individuals so the newbie wanting a 400k multifamily with an FHA loan probably isn't for me. 

I work with new investors all the time and have to get past newbie investor puberty which include Shiny Object Syndrome and  the mindset that this business is Quick Money with little to no effort (thanks to Social Media). 

I if go back in time when I was a newbie and investor in Mexico and I'd need to get information about how two invest in Mexico, I'd want to hear from other investors who have done it before rather than from people who sell properties and that's exactly what the forums are for.

I want to preface this by saying I'm an absolute newbie when it comes to real estate investing, but the more books and resources I consume, the more I find myself gravitating towards commercial real estate, specifically hotels!

@Albert Gallucci as many have pointed out, in the commercial space of 100+ apartment buildings and offices, property classes have some pretty decent industry standards.We started applying these to 1-4 unit properties around 10 years ago, which you can verify on our blogs, because we saw too many newbie investors not properly taking into account things like, neighborhood status, tenant pool, property condition, etc.Unfortunately, there's no industry standard for this, but you can use some basic logic to think your way through your own Classifications.

Don't discount your property and don't make the newbie mistake of renting to friends and family.