I am toying with the idea of retiring there when my kids have grown.

Evidence remains in hundreds of posts by new folks, especially in the wholesale threads.Take that class, then after a year come back an reread what I ranted about and reread your response, I doubt you'll have the same feelings, do it again 5 years from now and you'll probably laugh in agreement with me.Thank you for wishing  me success, but I've passed that reaching that years ago, I'm retired.  

Real estate is great, but only investing in 1 thing can open us up to a lot of problems.It is easy to bash people for only having a company retirement account to retire on, but if we think real estate is the only way to go and all of our assets are wrapped in Real Estate.  

I myself am a Veteran who proudly served in the US Navy during Desert Storm, my brother retired in the Army afer 22 years, my sister-in-law was a commissioned officer in the Army and my father served in the Navy during the Korean War on the USS Missouri.

It also changes as you get closer to retirement or don't have underaged kids causing you alarm.

If you buy for cash and rehab to raise value, then mortgage the property to get your money out for a repeat of the process, then the property had better pay off before you die, at least, or in my case, before I retire, since that's when I need the cash flow to start. 

Your options 1-5 are not passive.Best option if you want to retire is to sell and re deploy the equity in a vehicle that will return a fairly consistent income.

I started to lose track of the “big dream” of owning 30 rentals when I’m 40 and retiring.

I plan to launch my real estate business on the side and build up properties until I am able to secure enough cash flow to potentially retire from my primary job.My first rental was my primary residence so we have a decent amount of equity in the property (Current Market Value = $260K, loan $168K) and have a great 30 year fixed rate (3.25%).

Such plans are purely for diversifying your tax sheltered retirement savings into alternative assets such as real estate, but all activities must be exclusively for the benefit of the plan and you may not personally use the plan funds in any way.