So here you are, you got your foot in the door with a proprietary trading firm. Congrats! Your first taste at OPM(other people's money), now prop firms can be a fantastic foundation to learn and grow while making money. Can prop firms lead to financial independence? Yes, of course. The best approach is to leverage this situation to its full extent. Here is what that looks like in my own career. You are trading money with an established business, and that is other peoples money. What do accredited investors look for? People with a track record from an established business. This is the same when you look for employees in a business. Who is the best employee to try to get? The guy who has the most experience, from a real place of business indicating real, unbiased results. Take this time incredibly seriously, trade to the best of your ability. Think of this 25K, 100K whatever your account size is as 1M, 2M. You can trade with a prop firm, build up a track record, 1-3 years preferably or longer and you can take that track record and shop it to investors to back you with capital! People will take you much more seriously if you can prove your results like this. There is no faking it. Happy trading.
As a theoretical discussion, it seems to me that if one treats their 25K or 100K accounts as just that, 25K or 100K accounts, they will not over-leverage and get into trouble. Slow and steady wins seems better than fast, furious busts.
I disagree with you on the prop firm's benefits. There’s just no way can these firms help one make money from the trades that a trader would have individually entered. In fact, lately there have been numerous cases reported where the scams by these prop firms have been uncovered. I pity those who without bothering to check the background invested their money with these firms and have been waiting to get the refund. Plus why give access to your trading and money to some random third party trader when you can yourself take care of your investments?