We give his parents tickets to my husband's Christmas concert, a fundraiser for a charity organization in town that works with homeless people.

You could have a really nice niche business, though, with the right access to capital, and at this price point, that could be a single investor (or preferably a small group of people so there is always capital available).In terms of the mechanics of raising money from investors, see the post I did the other day in this thread:  https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/432/topics/53...Not all of it will be relevant to you, but the parts about the process of fundraising will be.I do have one question about your thesis, though.  

There is nothing to test here other than people’s potential stupidity.Even if the people behind this site have legitimate goals, the state of their fundraising website tells me everything I need to know to not to invest with them.

Now there is nothing wrong with you going to a fund raiser for him/gofund me page etc and donating $75.00 or $200.00 or whatever you feel comfortable with.

At fundraisers you always meet lots of people.

I always take title in LLC and form a new LLC for each acquisition.When you talk about fund raising/syndication, you enter a whole new ballgame with lots of guidelines and regulations.

I do volunteer work as well and during a fundraiser you always end up chatting with others.

And fund-raising is a strain.  

I also work at APSU in fundraising so there are some other avenues to networks that I might be able to assist in. 

You aren't looking for info or help, you are just badgering the same garbage to garner SEO rankings for your crap fundraising site.