Most counties have options to access the Tax Assessor, Recorder of Deeds and other sites for real estate records online.

Worst case, you could walk away and lose your earnest money deposit.

Very excited to be jumping in.I think the biggest question perhaps in the short-term is how much do I have to lose if I do *not* get everything completed before losing my active income source?

@Wayne WilliamIf you have access to the MLS or know an agent who does, that is easy information to obtain if it was listed.If not, you might have to research via the Tax Assessor's site.

Don't invest money you can't afford to lose. 

Are you investing in their fund or buying a note from the site ?

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is the ease of property management when you live on site vs being somewhere else. 

He took me from site to site on several properties at all phases, bought me lunch, took me out for a drink once, etc.

If the experienced investor has X number of personal notes and Y number of JV notes, do the personal notes get priority because she/he has money to lose on those? 

So, I could walk upstairs and dig out all the links and contacts and web sites for the research I did on self storage and post it here for you.... but I just sat down, opened an adult beverage, I'm lazy, and besides searching Google for all this will be half of the fun.