Question about Raising money for a new construction project

[Venu Vedre]

Big Namaste to all RE gurus here. Just started educating myself with RE investing. My day job is doing IT for an insurance company in CT. Started listening to Biggerpockets podcasts(still long way to go, but very inspiring ). Also reading through older forum posts and so much to learn.

Here are some (long) questions. Appreciate any advice.

One of my cousin lives in North Carolina. He signed a contract to purchase around 9 acres of land north of Charlotte(from a land owner), and he had submitted all the architectural plans/other paperwork(to build Apartment homes) - and recently got his permission from city town planning. Now his next step is close the land asap and get started on the actual construction work.(Looks like banks only give a construction loan if land is fully owned). He has around 40% of the cash needed to close and he is letting in family/friends on the initial investment(other 60%) to close the land for some equity in the project.

Here is what he is proposing: 

6 family/friends(includes me) should open a LLC and put the 60% of money required to close the land in the LLC bank account. The 6 folks will own this LLC as partners. This LLC will give/loan(not sure what the correct word is) money to my cousin's Company, and there will be an agreement to get a percentage of equity in the construction project(i.e each of the 6 investors may get an apartment after the construction project completes). If for any reason construction doesn't happen they will get a share in the land owned.

Question 1): Is there any better way to structure this? There are no trust issues with my cousin, we are very close but wondering if there are other effective ways to do this.

Question 2): How to get started on doing this. Should i just go to legalzoom.com and talk to them about this(or) Do i need a RE Attorney for this? Any references please. Also, stupid question: I heard a lot about opening LLC's in Delaware, can i open it there without living there? If yes, do i just go to delaware.gov and find one agent?

Question 3): This would be my cousin's first construction project ever. Any risks you can think of? So far he seems confident/motivated whenever i talk to him. He got a investor lined up who seems very interested in buying into(Capstone Property Management) and he is working with a local developer from charlotte(Capsigna Builders) to get his quote/costs.

Thanks a lot in advance!

Venu