I have been investing in traditional and Roth IRAs (and 401k when available with a company match) since I was around 18 years old but have started looking into real estate investing.

Here in WA you need to be with an agency even if you don't practice as a traditional real estate agent. 

.)~ If the LOC is from a traditional bank, do they also require you to have a checking and/or savings account with them? 

Here's the dilemma, should we do traditional financing?

However, if you put your property in an LLC, you might have difficulty in finding a traditional lender that will let you do a cash out (some community banks will still let you do it).  

Its more like, imagine you can use a well established RECF platform of your choice as a template, replace the logo and company info with your own, and wala you have a RECF platform. 

Although I'am not a lending proffessional, if you would like a referral I have lender who is familiar with sub-prime and non traditional lending, he may be able to offer a solution.

I'm an equity investor so instead of credit scores and payments, I buy ownership in the project - a great alternative to a traditional hard money lender (and also how I did my first no money deal).

This is a very specialty field served by a handful of firms from various parts of the country.Finding a provider with the right business model for your needs, and one with the expertise to help you succeed is much more important than where a firm is located.There are two business models, served by different kinds of companies.Self Directed IRA Custodians are financial institutions that provide processing services to document investments into non-traditional assets such as real estate, mortgages, etc.  

And, since they are a portfolio lender, they don't have many of the overlays (rules) that other traditional banks do.