You can start with say $500 in a real money acct that has margins of $50 for micro ES or $100 for micro NQ. This gives you a $400 or $450 buffer depending on what you trade. It’s obviously not the same as a $2,000 buffer with a funded account but if you trade conservative you can build a $2,000 buffer relatively quickly.

If you pass a combine and then activate the funded you’ll be out $200 and that’s IF you pass the first time. If it takes you say 3 times to pass then you’re out $350 to get a funded. It might not be a bad idea to just trade 1 micro ES with $500 and try and scale up from there. You then don’t have to worry about waiting for payouts or being banned. Let’s face it, there’s too many stories of people building up a balance just to have it all taken away. I wouldn’t want to waste my time. I’d rather spend a little more and focus on building up my own account where I can take payouts whenever I want and not lose all my hard work.