I am a real estate investor (with a concentration in buy-and-hold properties) as well as a Police Officer for the city and I will warn you that crime is an issue.

It's essentially MLM with a few guys doing deals concentrated at the top and a bunch of people not doing deals at the bottom

A few things I haven't liked about lending include the concentration of risk and the high tax rate.

The reason people DON’T get wealthy in real estate is that instead of going with a different service provider when they’re unhappy with a quote and concentrating on earning more money through additional and better investments - they spend the time and energy researching if they can sue, who they can sue, what agency they can report the vendor to, if a class action is possible and the very technical legal aspect of flat fee quote vs hourly quote.  

I'd also look into his specific college/university and see if they have a business major that concentrates on real estate. 

There are definitely pros and cons to each so I figured I would just lay out a few benefits and personal thoughts: Small banks/brokerages:Pros:- Some regional knowledge of the market- Possibility of more creative lending guidelines with bank specific programs- Sometimes they have competitive rates for their areaCons: - weak balance sheet (more strict on some guidelines, no wiggle room, inability to be flexible or grant exceptions because they cannot afford to hold less than perfect loans)- Can't scale with clients to different markets- Usually limits exposure to individual investors (they don't want one investor to be too big of a portion of their balance sheet)- Lack of experience with multiple solutions (tend to have 2 or 3 loan products they sell and are too niche to provide tailored solutions)Large banks/brokerages:Pros:- Large compliance departments that understand individual market guidelines (typically each state has specific lending guidelines that augment the national baseline)- Ability to scale into multiple markets with same lender (licensed in many states)- Impossible for individual investors to "outgrow" a large bank's balance sheet (not concerned with one investor's concentration)- More lending solutions available for different scenarios- Often comparable or better rates given the game is volume basedCons:- Can be more difficult to get fast responses if the bank/brokerage does not have good follow up systems in place (or if the underwriting/processing staff gets overwhelmed)- Bad large banks can feel less like a relationship and more like a cog in a factory (less personal)Overall, I have worked from both and worked with both as a loan officer, branch manager, and as an investor/client myself. 

My name is Jonah Rupe, I go to school here in Lubbock at Texas Tech University getting my BBA with a concentration in project management as well as a construction engineering minor.

I’m a recent graduate from community college and currently a senior at George Mason University, majoring in Information Technology with a concentration in cloud computing.

This lead to 3 years of very profitable success as a real estate broker, until having made some highly profitable deals I decided to quit the real estate “business” and concentrate on “investing” full time.Biggest “TAKEAWAY”: Most business owners and most sales people have a hard time turning down ANY piece of business.

The current concentration of most in that space is trying to hold long term.