I had a friend (non investor, yet) that said I should buy something that needs minimal work.

A great deal will minimize your risk, and you make your money when you buy. 

But life happens, and to be closer to family (and also minimize my commute to my day job in biotech) I think I am going to put my current house on the market and look for a multifamily property closer to Albany/Berkeley or on the peninsula.

Of course I will make errors but how do I minimize the downside and maximize the upsideWhat folks books videos are recommended to start this journey

Your profile is extremely minimal. 

Now the repairs are super minimal, less then 5k easily.

The return numbers are good enough that if the risk had been minimized I could work on raising the remaining down payment to get to 25-30% down. 

If I can not get access to the property, I will assume anything built before 1982 will contain asbestos/lead in common materials (based on my experience there's a 90% chance this is the case).I believe Texas requires any "contractor" performing ASB abatement to have a license, which means Texas has some regulations established regarding removal & disposal.In California, if you are the property owner you can perform the removal/abatement yourself (assuming SFR), the only requirement is that the asbestos waste be bagged up & taken to a designated facility (in my case in Santa Barbara there is a facility at UCSB where homeowners can take the waste at no/minimal charge). 

I found a lot with a SFH home on it, but its been zoned for a Multi-Family.How could I execute a purchase, tear-down, build.I want to purchase the house for say $150K cashtear-down the propertybuild a new duplex(MF)refi into a VA Loan.FYI my goal is to use my VA Loan at whatever stage of the process to best minimize my cash outlays.The tear down in Question is in Troy, MI in the Athens High School boundaries

To be completely honest I know very little and have minimal experience in the field, but I'm willing to learn and work hard,  as Ive done to become a great welder.So to end this here, if you're looking for some help or know of someone looking for help, I would appreciate it if you contacted me anytime, I can send my resume along with pictures of some weld work I do.