[Hoàng Hạc]

One more note on private lending, you need to hook up with a realtor and/or loan officer.  For some people, because of their shaky work history or credit report, they cannot qualify for any loan from a bank.  With a good down payment, you can loan them as a private lender.  Remember to be the first lien holder.  In case they forfeit the loan, you can take over the property and make more profit.  However this route requires more homework, to make sure the loan is right for the value of the property, go to court, etc. and we simple don’t have time for it.

You are right about the traditional private lending which requires you to do a lot of work. What I have found is private lending through a middle-man partner company that takes care of all the logistic and legal matters for you. This is truly a passive investment and the borrowers will pay for that middle man company . 9% is pretty decent return nowadays for a truly passive and relatively safe investment.

Here is the company that I am talking about. They have a good FAQ section that explains how they operate:

http://safeguardcapitalpartners.com/faq/

I do not have as deep a pocket like you so paying for a REI club membership is not how I operate. If I see any interesting talk from some big shot in RE world, then I rather pay one time admission fee for his talk rather than paying annual fee for the club.

Bigger pockets is probably the best RE investment site that I go to for RE related resource. You may want to give it a try