I agree with the advise above - DON"T QUIT THAT JOB.  

If you're doing a bunch of flips, the income you generate will be taxed as ordinary at your marginal rate (unless done out of a c-corp). 

I wish you were a CPA in WA so I could hire you for tax prep this year (did a 1031 exchange last year and was advised to outsource it rather than doing it myself this year).

Is the rent to value ration on your present home even close to acceptable for a rental.As for your future plans I would not advise buying a new build to turn into a rental.

Any advise on how someone would go about starting new with that amount in real estate?

Zillow has always been one of those "too good to be true" for me in terms of lead generation because if it were that easy, why are over 90% of agents still failing within 1-2 years of starting?

But I did tell them where to buy a generator .  

I know when I approach investors I need to bring something to them for the now like a hot lead, because let's say I want to do a cold calling campaign for them or do some lead generation or even build them a website, they don't really hire those services because they have been doing good just by simply putting a couple bandit signs or just of word of mouth references.

Real estate investing isn't something i'm doing as a serious form of income generation right now, but I'll be slowly growing my portfolio as we travel around.  

Pls advise