We both have chosen to contribute to individual 401k plan but through different brokerage firms to take advantage of different plan provisions.

You may get the promise of a great commission split at a small no name brokerage....but 95% of zero is still zero.

Property management would be the easiest, also consider getting your real estate license and working for a brokerage that primarily specializes in investment property sales.

Some of the biggest things to consider is what type of brokerage best fits your girlfriends RE aspirations.

Here is what I have found so far:-Auben Realty is the primary brokerage in the area who specializes in Real Estate Investments (Noah Utne mentioned specifically).

In order to focus your search, you should determine what your investment goals are and which type of program will best suit your needs.IRA Custodians (generally with the word trust in their name) are essentially doing the same thing as a brokerage, but have the staff training and paperwork to document non-traditional assets such as real estate, mortgage notes and stock of privately held companies.

My brokerage focuses on buy and hold investments for both investors and owner occupied situations.  

This hard money lender also owns a mortgage brokerage, and is willing to get things set up so we can do a re-fi immediately after we close. 

While I am certain you are going to get a plethora of answers, I will try to provide an answer that provides a more general guideline versus detailed specifics.Personally, each of my days has some amount of time devoted to the following:Education and trainingmarket research and analysisdatabase and contact managementadministrationreview and reflectionEducation and training could be as simple as taking an online course from the national Association of realtors, my brokerage or reading a book like The Compound Effect.  

I want to take these properties with me when I leave for my own brokerage.