I was very adamant about doing this and I now feel that I am well embraced in the REI community in Denver.

Not to be afraid of back taxes but embrace back taxes but as in any endeavor get your education and training. 

My advise to you (or anyone else who wish to self-directed their IRA or 401k): understand the rules and embrace them!

My understanding is they can still penetrate the LLC's protection as I am the sole manager of the LLC.

Those people (myself included) need to hear and embrace that perfection is not required.

Think about it, you are going to get moisture penetration so do you want to block it from escaping with a piece of plastic and then put a nice paper backed sponge in between to hold that water around your wood framing?

Embrace change and learning as reality and "surf" it to learning, networks, systems, software, processes that culminate in diverse earning opportunities.  

The SECOND you embrace this... you can finally stop clinging to methods that will RARELY find you motivated sellers like bandit signs, door knocking, cold claling, DMM etc. etc.THIS is the exact thing I have been tryign to convince people of ... for years (yet people accuse me of selling seo).You can do it yourself.

Then, expand from there@Emily Hinkebein You're already a business owner, embrace it :). 

In a market that only has 30% market penetration, zoned so "Stupid" money will have a hard time moving in.