Just because you did it and it didn't work out doesn't mean it's a bad idea. Your sample size is small.

Also, it's fine to take "just money" rather than money with value add. As long as it's not dumb money.

There are probably millions of companies since the dawn of enterprise that took small amounts of money from friends and went on to be successful, often because of it.

Rubbish. The statistics on successful businesses show that he is more than likely going to fail. If you take the money, in all likelihood the investor will never see a dime.

Now, I don't know how much experience you have, but taking money from family is stupid. A) they are biased. B) the familiy member will always be there, for the rest of your/their lives. C) the debt, therefore, will always be in your/their minds, especially if the "investor" lucks out of other investments. D) 25K is easily gotten from other sources.

When people say "don't use your own money" I think this includes family too. I'd much rather use mine than families.

So my advice: keep consulting, take his advice and leave his money. If it's a good idea, there'll be no shortage of money from outside sources.

That doesn't mean anything. The statistics on successful businesses might easily show that businesses that took money succeeded far more often than ones that didn't. And the overall statistics clearly show them to be +EV.

Just because there is a high failure rate doesn't mean the funding is not worth it for both parties.

A high failure rate means the poster should take much more care taking money from someone he will see for the rest of his life.

If the plan to make money is good, it's easy to get money, so why risk it? It's already a huge risk without involving your family.

I believe (big stress on believe) that there are big risks involved on mixing money and family, but as you said, it's just my experience, and what didn't work for me may work for someone else.