This is a great thread idea. PG should weigh in about cores etc. but even with my maxed out 2018 Mac Mini at my home setup, I was maxing the CPU out easily at 96k and getting audio dropouts in WaveLab when trying to master all “in the box”.
I had to add an eGPU (Sonnet external graphics card) to offload some graphics demands from the Mac Mini to the eGPU so I wouldn’t get audio dropouts. it worked. Usually, when I started getting audio dropouts, it was when certain plugin GUIs were open and I was trying to adjust things, but when I closed the windows, the audio dropouts would go away until I reached a point where even with all plugin GUIs closed, problems were happening.
I’m not saying you can’t use a Mac Mini, because maybe mine isn’t optimized well, or I use too many CPU hungry plugins, but I’m close to moving my iMac Pro from my studio to home, and getting a new Mac Pro for the main studio. I might have a maxed out 2018 Mac Mini for sale 
Maybe a Mac Mini could work well so I’d get some other opinions but this is my current situation. The eGPU was essential to getting things stable for audio work but the bummer is that it makes a little noise, and gets warm. I put the eGPU in a compartment for noise purposes but that causes it to get VERY hot which doesn’t seem good.