@Brendan M Brown if you have the flexibility, I’d consider going to work for a real estate investment firm of some type.  

You will have to become active and join a firm where you'll have oversight, and if you want keys to the kingdom so to speak (unlock doors/show property) you'll have to subscribe to your NAR MLS, perhaps your commercial board, and all the memberships your firm requires.

Also, demand to speak with the law firm representing the LLC/Syndicator.  

We as a firm have investors working with us who have rental properties all over the US big and small.Finding a real estate-focused tax professional and one who can help with advisory and grow with you would be my suggestion to focus your efforts on finding.

NickWe are considering doing a 1031 to get started in the Midwest - do you have any tips or local firms you recommend who can do out of state 1031's? 

We use this firm and have had good experiences with them: Thrasher Buschmann & Voelkel, P.C.Good luck!

Not many are out there but more of the commercial firms are more experienced with it. 

Spent $5,000 to $10,000 for an off the shelf asset protection “system” that doesn’t work in real life; $10,000- - $30,000 for individual planning by asset protection law firms that also doesn’t work, or spend $50,000 on up for true asset planning protection by the few attorneys who have the expertise and experience necessary to come up with a plan that has a reasonable shot at surviving creditor attack.For most the basics will get you where you need to be.

That’s exactly what it is - a third party cpa firm goes in and verifies if we say investors got X they got itThink of any mutual fund, when they publish there 1,3 and 10 year performance it’s not them doing it - it’s a third party that follows the same set of rulesIn speaking with this firm it was kind blowing how they noted some people calculate returns.Some will use depreciation in there analysis, some will go off costs per year and not at time of expense, some will note gross for entire fund not gross for investor or net for investorIt was very educational and informative.

You may want to consider a smaller firm.