1 - It's still a federal crime to grow/process/distribute/sell/possess cannabis.... Cali state laws say that a person with a recommendation to use cannabis medicinally, can grow cannabis with restrictions.... The restrictions being applied to whichever county the patient resides in or exemption amounts can be recommended by a doc if the county restrictions will not provide enough medicine for that given patients needs....

2 - 10k is nice chunk of change for someone to start a grow op.... However, knowledge of growing cannabis will be the key factor as to whether your family member will be successful.... If your family member has had successful grows on a small scale, their chances are that much greater of putting the 10k into good use.... IMO, 10k would be enough to start.... And if your family member knows what they are doing, you should get that 10k back with the first harvest....

3 - Technically, patients are not supposed to "profit" from growing.... They can however be reimbursed for the "excess" medicine they provided to the dispensary.... But again, this is where skill and knowledge come in because if the final product isn't medicinal quality, it will be that much harder for him to get in.... Some people think that indoor growing is as simple as throwing some seeds in soil and placing them under lights....it's not as easy as some people make it look.... Also, as in investor, do you seek to gain something each month or is it just a loan to a family member??? Big difference when it comes to who's liable and who can be blamed/gone after....

4 - Ask your family member this, "How much do you think you can yield from each plant?" "Like how much finished dry product will you get from one plant?". If he says that he can get up to a pound from one plant, don't invest/lend....with an answer like this, he doesn't have the knowledge/know how to put the 10k to use yet.... If his answer sounds something like, "Well it depends on space, light intensity, nutrients, method, vegetative time, CO2, etc."....if the answer is something like this, then his knowledge of growing may be trustworthy....

Just my :twocents:....

CGI::::::