I have some guesses as to what the problem may be, but I need a good, investor-friendly plumber. 

if you're not doing so already, i'd go to meetups and just work on making friends and business contacts. 

I have a friend that buys and sells quite a bit in SoCal.

A friend of mine is a successful wholesaler, so I asked him how he does it.

Start with your closest friends and family but they will invest with you because of your relationship not necessarily because of the real estate or your real estate acumen. 

Once you start working with an investor friendly agent, they can bring you deal flow that matches your criteria.

Hello,I am a Software Engineer and a Real Estate Investor working on a tech product for the real estate mortgage brokers. I would love to chat with someone who is a mortgage broker to understand your day to day workfl...

@Frank Alfano agency debt is very competitive (75-80 ltv, non-recourse, fixed-rate etc); you can syndicate and raise the equity portion needed from friends and family, provided you can market and lead the project.

Unfortunately, many new investors drool over how many crapboxes they can buy and brag to their friends about owning.

Here’s a more polished version of your message:Hello BiggerPockets community,A close friend has been encouraging me to get into real estate investing for years.