In our still relatively limited experience, seller financiers are usually looking to get a higher asking price in exchange for the favor of the private loan. 

--------------------------------------I don't think it prevents you as an owner from initiating the action.Personally, I wouldn't have any moratoriums on private transactions.  

If you are apprehensive of the market, and believe it will get worse before it gets better, you might consider going to cash, doing a private loan to a flipper on a project where it would be a screaming deal if you had to foreclose, and taking a look in 9 or 18 months. 

Our lease contains a clause stating the security deposit cannot be used for the last month's rent. 3.

The vast majority of lawsuits against Landlords are for wrongful eviction, security deposit disputes, and Fair Housing Violations.

They have a group of funding sources that will compete against each other, this helps keep the final interest rate within reason, and offer a partial refund if they are unable to secure financing. 

There funding is almost never secured for more then a year at a time.

I put 20% down using personal and private lending.How did you add value to the deal?

Question is: if I have one of these LLC (owned husband and wife, in a non-community property state), but it's a just a passive LLC - such that all it does is owns public securities (ie, our brokerage accounts are titled in the name of the LLC), does the same rule apply?

Also, if this is something that you are looking for in a hard money lender, you might want to look into more of a private money lending model verse anything else.