Investing as a Family: LLC or not?

[Account Closed]

Hello everyone! I am looking to begin investing within the next couple of years with about 7 of my family members. Most of us are on board with the idea that we should create an LLC to purchase investment properties with. With so many people involved, we think it would be a much better option for liability reasons. However, a few of us think it would be better for us to individually purchase the property under our names to avoid some of the difficulties of securing property through an LLC.

My wife and I are meeting with a banker this week for some professional advice, but I decided to pose this question here as well for some community feedback.  Most of the information I read online in regards to this debate usually involves an individual person purchasing for themselves.

[William Morrison]

I think it's great if you have 7 of you on board.
It's probably fun to discuss the investment properties you want to go after.
Spend time discussing each individual's long term goals and plans.  What are the exit strategies and plans.  How will you deal with conflict and divorce.  What will your plan for partial withdrawals  be.  Don't forget to discuss the tax effect each brings. 
I'm assuming you're not the Walton's of Wallmart.  Grin.  There are many ideas, some fact and some implied as to the advantages of requiring one to be an Accredited Investor for certain offerings.  One advantage is those individuals can commit to long term plans say 10, 15 years and longer, even 50 without needing access to the money.  Accredited does not mean smarter.  You probably wont have that, so you need a plan.