Hi Lakeem, I think gaining credibility is a tough game for anyone at any age, but here is my advice based on trying to gain credibility to raise funds for myself1. have a nice, clean professional website and a email address that goes to your domain name and not some gmail address, put up past project on the site so people will know you've done projects1b.

Ernest,I would strongly suggest you attend some of the REIA events and also check out meetup websites for real estate professionals.  

I humbly offer just a couple of edits to your well-crafted sentence:My company finds motivated seller opportunities for other investors by doing our own marketing and generating off market deals for serious cash buyers ...

We have a website but that's about it. 

This website is a great place to start.

I also like the calculators available in the tools section of the website and use those daily to analyze deals.My husband and I are natives to NWA and I hope you love it here as much as we do. 

I found the HUD web site for you.

I found out about it on BP website.

Turns out the old version of IE on my office computer doesn't work well with this web site!  

If you 1099 the money, they have to pay taxes on it ... so it will be a good litmus test for you to see how your contractor(s) react.Also, it may not be the worst idea to create a business entity of some kind ... eventually, it could make your taxes a little easier to manage (so you don't have to do one enormously scary tax return)Edit: try to find a CPA that is familiar with REI, that will make questions like this easy to answer in the future.