Administratively, you need to operate the LLC entirely separately from yourself. 

I was actually about to start school fulltime in August to obtain my bachelor's in business administration but after some soul searching, and a lot of reading, I am eagerly diving into all thing's real estate.

There are several administrative services that you can globally outsource for a fraction of the local cost. 

There's a long, long history of why downtown suffered so much, but the current mayor Tom McNamara and his administration are doing wonders to breathe life back into it.

IMHO the administration has key structural financial change planned.

I spent thousands of dollars and years building a database of owners in numerous states for a certain asset class to obtain off-market deals.

There are so many features that are available on the free plan specifically designed for new investors to get them started in building their prospect database (lists) and sending their first marketing campaign.

The consultant is still required to do a site visit and current database search.  

However for me, since I don’t have long standing REI relationships, I need to start with the data. Based

Couple of key things to consider:Lending on local fix and flips is not a comparable alternative to investing in syndications...one is a short term strategy and the other is long term (i.e. have to vet 10+ properties (and flippers) over five years vs investing in 1 five year syndication)Getting out is always (not occasionally) a challenge with syndicationsMentor has a lot of eggs in one basket (single market fix & flip)Do not, I repeat, do not invest all in one network/coaching program with inexperienced sponsorsMany passive syndication investors diversity across asset classes (MF, MHP, SS, dollar stores, grocery stores, government buildings, etc.) and across geographiesTo answer your actual question, below are ways to ferret out opportunities:Network...a lot (on BP, at meetups, with commercial real estate brokers)Network with other passive investors (find them on BP)Contact Jeremy Roll to get in his investor database (I have no affiliation)Listen to this podcast: https://forinvestorsbyinvestors.com/library/episod...Call the top 50 or so operators in the asset class that you are interested in (MHP academy has a list for MHP operators, insideselfstorage.com for SS, etc.)Call the large local commercial brokers and see who is syndicating in your market of interestListen to podcasts (not just BP) and call the guests who are syndicators (they jump on the podcast circuit when they have an open offering)The crowdfunding sites have a ton of offeringsAnalyze a ton of opportunities and contact lots of sponsorsIt starts to snowball from thereIt can take a year or two to generate good deal flow.