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Don, you have me, all the way up to "Some Modelers don't yet have space for any layout. This is where I believe a real foundation can be laid:" and then you put a roof of clouds over my head!
These elements you have laid out are all good and well, and they're the fun part of planning the foundation. There's a far more important foundation one should consider, though, that at your age may be years forgotten being far behind you, but for those kids building that clubhouse it would be the one that made all the difference!
As a hobby, model railroading works best when all the other obligations in life are filled first. So I would suggest someone my age or a decade younger would be best set laying the foundation by taking a real good long thought about financial planning - investments, retirement, where they're going to work, what they're going to do for a living, and how they're going to get from that little apartment up to that train room with a house attached.
There's other details that are harder to plan out, for instance, The Wife. In my case, she doesn't exist yet, so I have to ask the question, how upfront am I about my hobby with prospective dates? Sure, I could pretend to hide it, but by doing so, I'm sure shooting myself in the foot years down the road when I find out she's as anti train as they get! Or worse, she may be a New York Central modeler! This being said, marrying the wrong person can have a catastrophic impact on that future foundation. And so too can marrying the right woman, if she's the type who has a long honeydew list and a short icandew list.
Or perhaps maybe a life without a wife and kids and that whole segment would be better, at least, for my hobby - and I know a man in person who didn't get married but spent his whole life making models, very nice models, but...in a lot of ways it feels something is left out. These are questions we must all ask ourselves before we get much older!
The single most important question is the matter of employment, and branching from here, what one does in their free time. Sure, building trains is a lot of fun, but one must review what they are doing, what they can do, and what they want to do, and then ask the question, "Is this the best use of my time Right Now?" If one is driven to study a programming langauge or network systems instead of reading about trains, then that could lead to a job that pays for more trains than one could ever imagine.
My generation was brought up on the "you must got to college to get a good job." I'm here to say, take those words with a grain of salt and then look at the real world employment market in your area or the area one wants to live in. In my case, I would have been better served going to community college and becoming an electrician - but I wouldn't have known that ten years ago! This being said, with where I am now, I'm on a trajectory where my electronics career can go towards aircraft avionics - now there's a good job that provides enough for all those investments that lay a good model railroad foundation!
I briefly just touched on it, but there is then this matter of deciding where you want to live. Location Location Location! I knew a model railroader who used to live in New Orleans, below the levee level. As soon as I saw his situation, my hair rose on end! Not but a couple years later, Katrina went through and he lost a great portion of his model railroad investment. It's a good question to ask, what will happen if a flood, tornado or a fire comes through here? It's also good to ask, is this an area I could Retire to, if it all came said and done? Where you live could determine how many other model railroaders are in the area, another important consideration!
Where you go will change local building styles - Basements versus concrete caliche floors! And then too, your square footage. If you're in an expensive area, you may be getting a very small apartment for the same money that in other areas will get you a huge ranch style house. Will there be room ont he lot for a large outbuilding? And theres more considerations, but they all need to be taken, decisions made, and action taken to lay that Foundation!
I agree, you need a good foundation to build a model railroad - and while dreams are great, there's nothing better than having the means to go forth and build those dreams!
