My biggest issue is probably the local governments and their insanely inconvenient and dumb regulations. getting permits is a pain, ordering inspections is a pain.

@Andrew Lapham so each local municipality and county have their own zoning regulations.

I suppose you could even have a VA do the outreach if they were properly trained and knew all the regulations to follow. 

We have all lived in a very comfortable environment of low-interest rates and quantitative easing/easy money policies for a number of years, and this has benefitted both home owners and ordinary real estate investors with low leverage costs.

VA Loans have several regulations.

Well unlike Account Closed  advice I don't think he saved you 25k in fees  LOLthis is quite simpleyou have the developer sell you the lots.. on  contract  .. the developer then subordinates his beneficial interest in said contracts to the Banks construction loan.. you are the owner you build and then sell.You can do a participation note with seller.. so they get a fixed number plus a little interest on the note and then a % of profit if you wish.now the only wrinkle will be if the construction lender will allow a junior loan on this and you having no real skin in the game.If the construction lender wants the lots as true equity.then you would need to for a JV agreement with developers portion the lots.. and what ever your business arrangement is.. if the developer has less than 20% interest in this newly formed LLC for these two build jobs.. then they will normally not be required to sign on the construction loans.Construction loans in today environment are very tough especially specs.My Portlandia bank will give me 12 specs and my Charleston bank will give me 6. so i can have 18 homes going at one time.  

I wonder how regulated the field is for a person who would lend "on the side" while working a non-real estate full time job.

If you draft a note you want to make sure that the note is compliant with any and all Federal and State Regulations.

I also think cash is crazy in today's interest rate environment...unless you plan to immediately refinance.

Private lenders are an abundant source of funding, but there's no bricks-and-mortar establishment, no standard process other than SEC regulations, just your own ability to build relationships - a key skill for an agent / broker.My $0.02 ...