Worries about partnering with buddies on a deal!

[Soniel Estime]

I have two friends who would like to partner with me on a few deals. They were telling me about how they were thinking of investing and after I told them of my past experience with real estate, they jumped on me about partnering. I have done one house hack where I got ripped off by a contractor and hit with fines by the city of Chicago.(Finished the project and got some good equity in the deal but wouldn’t call it a home run). They want to join in on a project that I was thinking of taking on where the rehab would be about $130,000. I an unsure if I should partner with them on such a large project because the relationship with my sister in law was damaged due to her referring the contractor that ripped me off... and i would hate for that to happen with these guys. If I lose money that is one thing, but if I lose their money, and friendship because of it , that would be devastating. My question is,

Should you mix friends and business?

How do I avoid damaging the friendship if the deal doesn’t go well?

Should I wait to do a few more deals on my own first before partnering with them?

Have you ever partnered with a buddy, and the deal not go well?

How did you handle it and what was the outcome?