Hey all!  I'm new to the forums (first post), although I've been lurking for a minute.  I've been wanting to get some advice from people about my specific situation, but there's a lot so I'll try to keep it to the point;

In short, I'm wanting to "officially" start my real estate investing journey, making it my source of income - and I'm wanting to do house flipping as my strategy, at least initially.  I'm a carpenter / contractor by trade, and I've done a few major whole-house renovations of personal homes over the last decade or so.  So this is right in my wheelhouse, I'm just now trying to put together my plan on how to jump in and execute.  It's also worth mentioning that I already have a good relationship with a wholesaler in town who knows other good contacts, and I am able to use some of these contacts as good resources for general knowledge and learning how it all works.

I recently had to close my business of 9 years, and so instead of getting a W2 job or start some other "normal" business, I'd much rather prefer to have house flipping be my primary source of income. I closed my business about a year ago, and have been working on my current house renovation in the interim while I figure out what's next. I have a considerable amount of equity in the house (HCOL area), and after the renovations are complete we are looking to sell the house in order to use the proceeds to kick start the next venture (flipping). Since I don't have a W2 anymore, I can't qualify for any sort of equity loan on my current home so I don't see my home's equity as a means to do anything unless I sell. For ballpark numbers, we bought the home for $850k ($715k left on the mortgage), and once the renovation is complete we'd be looking to sell for about $1.5M. I have some previous business debts to payoff, so once all the dust has settled with realtor commissions and other closing costs, I'd have roughly $400k-500k of cash at my disposal. Also for reference, pretty typical SFH flip type properties in my market are about $300k - $400k price tag. In my ideal scenario, I would do some more entry level projects to start off while I learn the ins and outs, but my goal would be to eventually work on more luxury flips - larger scaled projects in more desirable neighborhoods (though fewer and farther between).

SOOO, I guess my question is "what would you do in my situation?"  I listen to a lot of podcasts and read a lot here on the forums, but it seems that most people start as a side hustle while keeping their W2 for a while.  I will essentially have a bag of cash but no W2 or desire to get a W2, so I'm likely going to go the hard-money route.  What's the best way to use the cash on hand?  Anyone else out there started out flipping by jumping into the deep end?  

Thanks in advance and I'm open to any thoughts / advice / new perspectives!