Brian, you would be surprised what you can do with an average 9 to 5 job if you learn about money and investing. I'm an engineer working a 9 to 5 (well, more like 7 to 6 plus nights and weekends). No family money (I had some help paying for my state school tuition, but I paid 80% of my expenses myself through summer jobs), I'm only 40 years old so certainly haven't owned my houses for 40 years though I did buy before the recent boom, no luck in tech. I come from a middle-class family where both parents were educators. My first job was a Peace Corps volunteer in Africa, beign paid $300 per month! Just a good paying engineering job for a large public company and a lot of hard work on the side to learn about investing (not to mention low living expenses, despite having 4 kids). I spend my time on Medium trying to help others achieve what I have, and you are welcome to read more about my story on my profile or to learn more about how to build wealth with real estate or the stock market. I explain in detail the strategies I have used. I wish everyone knew more about money and did better with investing to have more choices in life and am doing what I can to help on that front.
Just a note that most of my properties are in Austin, where house prices have increased, but rents have been flat for several years - so rents have definately not skyrocketed everywhere. My costs have increased (property tax is almost 3%), but rent has not. In places like Texas where there is much more freedom to develop properties, more properties are built and prices (and rent) usually grow quite modestly (this past year has been an exception to that rule). That is one reason why Texas and other similar states remains much more affordable than the West coast and why so many people and companies are moving from California to Austin and other cities.
One thing I can say is that if you moved to Texas, you would instantly be a lot richer than sticking around a high-priced city like Portland. It is much easier to build wealth with low cost of living.
