@Terra Padgett, passive is really in the eye of the beholder, unless you are talking IRS definition; then, it is defined as passive.
As you will see here, some people simply want the "freedom" of not being bound to their corporate job and a desk. But when anyone gets to the scale of owning enough rentals to actually make a living, I think they learn that they simply traded one job for another, often harder, job.
As far as syndications go, they are only somewhat more passive than owning rentals, and I think it really depends on your mentality and attitude toward them. Just like all real estate, they are not a silver bullet to grow your wealth. You are clearly giving up a lot of control to a group that will ultimately make decisions that may not align with yours. Unfortunately, syndications are a lot like Airbnbs: they are all called the same thing, but the experience you have will vary widely. And most of the return is going to be driven by market conditions, regardless of how good or bad an operator is. But the same can be said about buying a SFR.
Things no single person/company can control: rents, interest rates, supply and demand. You/the company can make bets and predictions that may turn out alright in the end, but they could go the other way on you too. And as we are seeing, the cost of a miss in a syndication is just a lot bigger than the cost of a miss in a SFR. So given a syndication is needed because the GP, presumably, cannot fill out the capital stack for a $20mm-$100mm deal on their own, when that miss happens, it often needs to be born by the LPs, either by selling for a loss, or capital call. A single family, if the buyer uses all their money to acquire, will result in the same thing, but only the buyer has to bear that burden.
