Private lender for down payment?

[Brad Tisdale]

Hello BP! I need your advice. I'm fairly new to the game, but looking to scale. I'm a buy and hold guy (own 5 doors now), but have burned through my free cash. I've found some off-market properties (a triplex and a duplex) that I'd like to pursue. My question is: should I consider a private lender for the down payment? Since these are long term deals it will be harder to define an exit for the private lender, but they will get a preferred interest rate. Per @mattfaircloth, I should try private lending before private equity deals just for simplicity sake at the start of this journey. In this scenario, the private lender would be coupled with traditional financing from a bank, so LTV would be relatively high, but they would still cash flow at my desired metrics. I'd appreciate any wisdom you may be willing to share.