Not bad to have a professor as a personal reference!

The contacts I will be reaching out to will be mostly friends, previous employers (who own many commercial real estate properties), undergrad professors, etc.

Led by a professor who brought personality to finance, it was no surprise to hear that he worshipped real estate (& stock options, but that's for another forum) and I caught the contagion.Since graduating, I've decided to continue my education on Youtube, reading various self help books (Think & Grow Rich, Rich Dad Poor Dad, etc.) and finally finding BP to complete.

I plan to retire from my full-time job as a college professor/administrator in 2017.  

I've even asked professors, to which most just told me to choose the one I was more interested in.

And 36 Other Key Financial MeasuresInvesting some time on The Mortgage Professor's site:Mortgage Professorwill also teach you about loan types for residential properties.  

In college I had a professor who said "today we are not going to learn anything related to the subject and it will be the most important thing you learn in this class and probably you college education". 

I live in a college town, too, and since I'm a college professor, I've had success renting my duplex to college students in my classes whom I've come to know personally and can trust them to be reliable, clean, and quiet.  

I went for a semester and found my self taking notes on YouTube videos about the stock and RE market 90% of the time rather than listening to my professors.

You can do that by being an authority on a subject (i.e. hosting or speaking at a meetup), showing people who have invested with you (startups do this all the time by stating which big name VCs have backed them, you can do it by pointing out job titles or something: professor from USC or CEO of X company), showing your past projects (all of them, not just the ones that did good), or just offering your help (i.e. help someone analyze other projects they are considering, but if the other projects are better than yours you should say so).Building trust isn't really part of your REI pitch though.