Let me address some questions to the responses so far, piece by piece: "The safest idea you presented here is probably the property rental and development. It would probably be the easiest too, allowing for a large degree of time to spend at home with your fiancee, while providing a dependable return on investment over time, provided you buy the right property, or can manage the process of developing them. Consider that you don't yet have relationships with the local contractors you might have to rely on, so at the moment you have no real way to gauge their quality should you need their services."
This is the safest idea, and the one I am most likely to do, no matter what. Through High School, and halfway through college, I worked with a contractor, building kitchens, putting down flooring, doing electrical, plumbing, and all the rest. While I would, of course, get help from some contractors I know, I can pull my own weight when it comes to home improvement.
"After that there's the Business Consultant. I would imagine you have the knowledge and experience to do this, but a consultant is a freelancer. You'd be stepping into the world of unreliable income. I have no idea what rates you could feasibly charge, and the hours you have to dedicate would probably vary from business to business, but your prime concern in this field becomes marketing yourself to potential customers to either grow or at the very least provide a sustainable level of income. It would help if there was a business or two that you knew needed help. Even if they're small, local businesses. Offer them your expertise at a cut rate, perhaps, to prove your expertise. You prove you actually can help a failing business, then you grow your consultancy from that success."
This idea I have only recently toyed with. I have over 6 years experience managing large groups of resources, optimizing utilization, morale, and revenue, both known and future, with hiring goals and resource placement. It came to me that having this expertise, and then wasting it, would be somewhat of a shame no? It would take quite a lot of cold calling and marketing to get into that market. The only thing I can think of is offering my services for free, and turning a business or two around, then using that as a selling point for future business. I also don't know how much I would enjoy traveling around for business, since I really do enjoy being around my loved ones a lot, and work/life balance has been a the sore point in my current career.
"The wildcard is the motorcycle business, and I'd love to hear you elaborate on that. You didn't drop a Youtube link to your motovlog so I can't go look, but are you envisioning like a repair garage? Or do you have a design in mind for a whole new vehicle?"
Here's where I start getting really interested. I have been into motorcycles, and frankly into anything that I can travel on (horse, bicycle, car, plane, helicopter) since I was a toddler. I'm very much into motorcycles now, and I feel there is a void, especially in NY state, of alternative motorcycle brands. In NYC, you can get any brand you like, but if you venture out, even 20 miles outside of NYC, you see that you really have limited shopping options. I bought my motorcycle at a place I wish never existed. Bad pricing, bad service, overall bad experience. If I was a casual rider, I would have taken my business elsewhere, maybe get a boat or a jet ski. I think that through this under served market, there is an opportunity to import Chinese motorcycles that are great, but inexpensive. I have a potential business partner, already in China, that is also a designer, and is currently busy designing furniture in China. I would love to go with him to a chinese manufacturer, or two, get some designs in front of them, import a couple of bikes, test them, use my engineering background (I took 3 years of mech engineering) and mechanical experience to improve the bikes in terms of quality, build a small steel warehouse to house some parts (for warranty and service) and start selling motorcycles. This idea is what I am most excited about, and my fiance would definitely back me, but it just seems to me like it is the most far fetched. Then again, the guys over at Cleveland CycleWerks did the exact same thing, and they are doing pretty well, so proof of business is already in existence. Here is my young Youtube Channel: FlyinGato and my Book Face page: https://www.facebook.com/NewYorkGato.
