So, the investment thing is a real consideration. I mean, again, never having done this but BB probably means:
Coach
Posing coach
Posing trunks
Tanning cost
Music cost?
Photo cost
Hotel
Registration
There he is! I mean bb has always been my first love.
Okay, so a few things to consider here.
Time Investment - Hands down the time needed for BB far surpasses what is needed for a PL meet.
Discipline Required - No competition here, the level of discipline required to compete in bodybuilding is much higher. You will have to stay on point for a long period.
Family Involvement / Support - Before committing to bodybuilding you have to get a commitment from your wife that she is also willing to sacrifice for this goal. There will be times they miss you, there will be many times you cannot eat with them, or can not splurge while they are eating including special events, birthdays and the like. There will be times when the baby needs something, and you need to do posing practice, so who gets the double duty in that case? The wife. So there is a level of support and buy in that she has to be willing to commit to. If not she will resent you, and lifting over things that are unavoidable in a bodybuilding prep.
Cost - No doubt BB is going to be more expensive. registration.
Coaching - pretty important but not required. - You have a good team around to assist if needed.
Posing Coach - Can be expensive but to be honest if doing this as a I just want to get on stage and compete, look my absolute best and be able to say I finally competed in my passion. You can absolutely do without it. You would just need to start practicing earlier, but the reality is get good at the mandatories and then you can do mandatories as your posing routine. I was surprised how many people I saw just going through the mandatories for their routine just adding in transitions from one to the other.
Tanning - around $150
Music - Free, just edit your song to 59 seconds in length
Photo Cost - $100-150, or Have the wife buy VIP show tickets and bring a good camera. VIP tickets get you up by where the photographers are.
Registration - NPC Registration $150 then 100-150 for show
With all of that, honestly on paper I would say that a PL meet would be the easier option. However, the bolded and enlarged portion of your post here changes that for me personally. If BB is your first love, and your passion then I would say if you feel on point, then now is the time to strike since the iron is hot! The more something means to you the more rewarding it will be when you achieve it. So for me, I honestly feel that although the BB would be much more challenging, I think it would also be that much more rewarding for you.
I can tell you that I did a PL meet years back, and I killed it. On top of winning my class overall, I got best lifter which is based on weight lifted to body weight ratio. I enjoyed it greatly. However, even with winning the whole meet the bodybuilding competition was far more rewarding because it was my first love! That and because it took so much more to get to the finish line.
If you do choose to do PL, I would say that RP Strength is an excellent first meet. That is where I competed and everyone was awesome. The pace of the show was great, and everyone told me it was a little more relaxed than the bigger federations. I am not sure, since it was the only place I competed in PL, but it was a great experience.
this allows me to kick off the new year with bench day too, so there's that.
heaviest BW ever for me is roughly around 184# give or take, but I'm more comfortable around the mid-160s (which I'm about 5-10# above right now).