They said that the property was unsecured (violation of section 19E) and overgrown yard (violation of section 25A).

So, if you pay loan costs tell the borrower to see their tax advisor.Several techniques to use, pay new loan costs, discount the payoff, refi less and take an unsecured note for the change, payoff other debts to help them qualify or buy down the interest rate on the new loan.

If you learn early on that you need to budget and reduce your spending (bad debt, ie. credit cards, unsecured loans, multiple vehicle payments  so on and so on) you can still invest in RE making even a meager salary.  

Real Estate really outperforms largely due to leverage.As a crude example:8% return in the S&P 500 if you had $10,000 investment is $800. and if you could only put 20% down you'd return $800 on $2000 "down payment" or 40% return.Some  people like the truly passive ~8% return over the a little bit more work and little bit more risk and greater return.When you buy stocks, most buy them unleveraged, so to compare to real estate, an 8% cap rate on a property isn't horrible.

One final point, it is always easier to apply for a credit line, unsecured loan, or mortgage, when you can show part-time or full-time salary.  

For instance, if you buy a $30,000 pig that cash flows $400/month unleveraged on paper, chances are that because of what it is and where it is this cash flow will never materialize as anything remotely stable.

Also, this is unsecured lending.

To fund deals, we were thinking about having the IRA hold a note against the LLC (unsecured) as opposed to the property.  

In return, I give my investors a set percentage on their money through an unsecured promissory note.

Student loan debt is huge and will likely be a huge problem in the future, taking on that large amount of unsecured debt so young is like a weight that you will carry all through life.