Some trust real estate, some trust the stock market etc. 

@Daniel Saunders,Get familiar with how to raise money from people with self-directed retirement accounts, or folks with retirement accounts who are looking for better returns with less volatility than the stock market.By definition, private lenders are people with whom you have established a relationship before discussing money.

For instance if you had a hundred grand in the house and the stock market went up 10% in that year, you lost 10k of potential earnings by having it in the house vs investing it elsewhere.

Capital expenses tend to level out over time, rents tend to increase, and trying to time new roofs & new HVAC at the same time as a market high is like trying to time the stock market.

If you invested $5000 in the stock market and made 30% wouldn't you be pretty goddamn happy???

Think of real estate as any other asset class, You wouldn't buy stock because the companies headquarters is local and you can drive around and look at the building.

This mean investing in small-cap stocks or emerging markets, for instance.  

Stick to the tried and true principles you've learned from other successful landlords on BP.

I'm not playing stocks here.

All of the above aside, real estate investing comes with one major (for me) advantage over the stock markets and that is the fact that I can personally investigate, choose, and manage my investments.