The links on his website to his newsletter archives are all dead, nor does the "Note Store" link work.

Location wise, it was close to the freeway and could walk to stores and restaurants but the negative factors outweighed the positive. 

Theodore - I don't recognize the color, but I would send the photo to a couple of "big box" stores and see what they suggest.

As to the suitcase, this is where I store client files.

Then it did take some time to build the credit as you would open up some credit lines through places like office stores.  

In a state that a lender can get a deficiancy judgement if the deal goes through foreclosure the client can get their credit trashed and end up with a big fat judgement against them.. ( state specific).the reason your probably getting buyers that want to do this is because of all the online notoriety currently like Pace Morby who is huge in the space and the legions of students and followers and then to a lesser extent there is BP's own Sub to Guys..

The RE used as collateral are either SFH, multi-fam, or small commercial (like a small retail store), and all in Calif. 

A store?

The hard money lender has tons of experience with lots of flippers in your market and if they approve the loan you'll know there's enough fat in the deal for them to be repaid. 

Someone who's grown up in San Francisco who works in a liquor store should not have to be displaced because of tech and a lack of housing.