Brought the remaining 20 duplexes and other inventory to my Big event ( which cost me 50k up front to put on) and sold all 20 that night..

As Jonathan said, attend some meet ups, we have quite a few here in Orlando.

You can meet local investors by registering to attend real estate events in your area: https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521-events-and-happenings6.

I took your advise and joined an event for next Monday in Irvine.

If you're local, check out this monthly REI meetup if you want to meet some other like-minded individuals and possibly find connections for your first deal... https://www.spacecityrei.com/events

He is a great and patient teacher, and after his 1-day class found thru my local Cincinnati REIA, and attending his 4-day bootcamp, my team is now seeking 30-50 unit buildings just to get started.  

I just checked, and while it does not appear that there are any upcoming events in central Illinois hosted by BP Members (https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521-real-estate-events-...), it does look like there are some big ones in other parts of the state. 

If you attend these meetings, what do you learn from them?

There's a whole section in the course about trials, sequence of events of the trial, how to get evidence entered into the record, when and where and how to object to errors...everything that is relevant to any case, civil or criminal is in there.

There are TONS of real estate meet ups you can attend monthly.