I'm not sure on 1) how to structure the lending part. the 3-5 yr part for the balance 2) what terms should I set for monthly payments 3) I'm in NY which is a judicial state do I have to use a lawyer 4) what are the risks for the property owner and myself 5) when and from who do I get my assignment fee6) If they have that much cash why not just get a loanThank you in advance for the advice !!!

@Mark DiGioia Accepting credit card payment or any type of merchant payment runs the risk of the payment being disputed and in some cases the payment get refunded to the customer.

Will depend on several factors like the type of property, type of tenants, your risk tolerance, other assets you own, your estate planning, laws where the property is located, etc.An LLC is a good idea if you're worried about liability in that as @Christopher Phillips said, any lawsuits would be limited to the assets of the LLC and not your personal assets (assuming you run the LLC appropriately and the corporate veil is not pierced). 

Might not be a bad idea to balance out your higher risk properties with a few that are much lower risk.

You pay for it, you work for it, you have substantial risk involved, the only person who should benefit is you.  

I told him about the REI meetings they have in our area where local RE investors support each other, give advice, network, etc. to basically say "tons of people are doing this," and his first conclusion was that it must be some "investing club" that's trying to steal my money and convince me to buy real estate from them so I take on the risk and they try to get in on the management side to take a cut.

Unless of course you are not risk adverse and saving a few thousand is more important than having more peace of mind.

Your savings vs. risk trying to do this yourself doesn't make much sense in my opinion.

A recent study of returns since the late 1800s found that unleveraged residential real estate outperformed the stock market on a risk-adjusted basis.

For all the risks that FRB and manipulation of the money supply has, and it has risks, they pale in comparison to the risks of a fixed money supply.