Many of them will meet in person and you never know who would will meet or learn at these groups. 

Bite the bullet and spend the money and use someone that specializes in the nuances and intricacies of evictions, especially in Commiefornia. 

There are definitely pros and cons to each so I figured I would just lay out a few benefits and personal thoughts: Small banks/brokerages:Pros:- Some regional knowledge of the market- Possibility of more creative lending guidelines with bank specific programs- Sometimes they have competitive rates for their areaCons: - weak balance sheet (more strict on some guidelines, no wiggle room, inability to be flexible or grant exceptions because they cannot afford to hold less than perfect loans)- Can't scale with clients to different markets- Usually limits exposure to individual investors (they don't want one investor to be too big of a portion of their balance sheet)- Lack of experience with multiple solutions (tend to have 2 or 3 loan products they sell and are too niche to provide tailored solutions)Large banks/brokerages:Pros:- Large compliance departments that understand individual market guidelines (typically each state has specific lending guidelines that augment the national baseline)- Ability to scale into multiple markets with same lender (licensed in many states)- Impossible for individual investors to "outgrow" a large bank's balance sheet (not concerned with one investor's concentration)- More lending solutions available for different scenarios- Often comparable or better rates given the game is volume basedCons:- Can be more difficult to get fast responses if the bank/brokerage does not have good follow up systems in place (or if the underwriting/processing staff gets overwhelmed)- Bad large banks can feel less like a relationship and more like a cog in a factory (less personal)Overall, I have worked from both and worked with both as a loan officer, branch manager, and as an investor/client myself. 

Other alternatives to save 20% each time include seller financing, partnerships, hard money loans, house hacking, portfolio loans, and private money lenders.

I am assuming you will need a downpayment and your scope of work is more than 30K so where does the money come from? 

Yes, it can feel like "wasted" money on months where rent is auto-paid and there is no maintenance to be done, but when you get a bad tenant or two or when deferred maintenance finally catches up to you, they certainly earn their keep.At your scale, you might be able to get a bulk discount with a good PM, especially if you can show how well your current systems are working and how they'd be needed less than usual.

Other factors to consider are what you plans are for the future (value add rehab, restructuring, selling the property soon, etc) and whether or not there are any events on your personal horizon that may impact your ability to refi later. 

hard money loan How did you add value to the deal?

A person who's at or near 100% LTV is over-leveraged.

@Jessica Cooper I personally invest in the Dallas/Ft.