I think the online lenders or a loan broker are your best choices.

Do you prefer working with individual freelancers or established teams, and why?

It is right on the muni bus line, and there is no need for a car when you can easily walk a block or two to so many amenities.For some people, co-housing is a lifestyle choice.

Opportunities in real property investment need to be evaluated individually on their own merits.  

Sometimes people confuse hard money with PRIVATE LOANS, which refer to individuals who lend their savings as investments.

Not sure about the individual experience but its a lead generation system where we Zs pool up money to advertise our services.

Please don't get separate LLCs that you own individually.

In all fairness though we are conservative and I personally go visit the market ( at my expense) and the individual we are going to work with before I start the program..

When we were selling any of our props if we felt we had one of those individuals ( most of my stuff was props  bought at courthouse and would sell as is) EM would be 5 to 10X higher other wise we would not take their offers..

I respect architects but they often don't know and/or don't care about the cost of doing things one way vs. another or how a simple choice can have an outsized impact on your budget.