Hi all

I am a young, recently qualified Chartered Accountant and dabble in online equity and derivative trading as a hobbie. I therefore consider myself reasonably finacially literate. Unfortuanately my career choice has not exposed me to the practical side of starting a small business or buying into an existing business.

My situation is as follows:

- I am 26 years old and have no commitments in terms of wife, kids or debt and therefore can afford to take a few risks.
- I am currently between jobs and have the opportunity of taking up a decent paying salaried position either locally or abroad.
- I am very keen to start earning income streams other than the salary that I am currently able to earn with the goal of these alternate incomes being able to completely support me in the future (ie passive income).
- At the moment I do not have a lot of cash or any major assets to use as collateral etc.
- I don't have any novel business ideas.

My question is as follows:

- What is generally considered to be the "easiest" way of entering the business world and how would I go about this?
Do I try to buy a residential property (either by myself or with partners) with the view of leasing it and from there try and acquire further properties?
Do I try the same thing as above except with commercial properties?
Do I try and buy into a franchised business (by myself or with partners)?
Do I look to meet people with clever ideas and invest with them and if yes where do I meet these people?
Do I look to buy a substantial chunk of private equity in an existing business and if yes where does one find opportinities to buy private equity?
Do I scratch my head and try to come up with some brilliant novel business idea and present this to the bank?

I do not have much money or assets so I would also like to know if it would be best to initially do the above in a partnership with friends or other business people? If so is there anywhere where I might meet or chat with people who have similar goals as me as well as meet with people who have done it all before and could advise me?

Thanks very much for your help