I have been a broker since out of college. There have been good times and bad. Nowdays, you can have a great stock that beats numbers, and the stock still gets hammered. It's becoming more and more of gambling. The buy and hold days are over.
I have been looking into some real estate as well with a friend. Like Doraf says, find someone you trust that is good at carpentry, and you supplying the money makes a good relationship. I think it also depends where you live to do this. In Florida where I live, people are making a killing...not sure if this applys to every part of the country. Plus interest rates could put a damper on things. I don't have the time to do the work myself or know how, but I have a great real estate friend. What I am looking at nowdays is just buying preconstruction homes at day 1 pricing if you can find out about them that early, and a year and a half later when they are done around here, they are up $75 to $100K. Or if you are in for the long haul and have good credit, buy a property and rent it and in so many years, you have a property that is fully paid for by other people. Yes, there are horror stories though for landlords having bad tenants. Nothing is for certain, but I think preconstruction is a great way. Thinking you are going to find a house in the weekend paper for cheap will not happen. You have to drive around and look for fixer uppers and make them an offer. Best of luck.