Yes, Silicon Valley has been perpetually 'Hot', due to the high tech jobs and life style in the area. 

In 2011 my wife walked into small 1950s cape style house that reeked from 60 years of cigarette smoke and fell in love with the property.

These, as you may know are two different neighborhoods, with different housing styles and different prices - but both of them have the potential to cash flow equally.  

Would love to know your thoughts about my management style, what you learned from and what you disagree with.

The general style, build and feel of homes in these 2 subdivisions are very similar, although I am only analyzing Oak Forest.

You could also add on an amount for bringing the apartments up to current style, but still use lower rents for income assumptions because you're the one who's going to have to do the work of raising rent.

I am fortunate that duplexes, specifically "shotgun doubles", are a very common architectural style in my city. 

What areas would you recommend and what style of housing is a good buy in our market?

I have drawn plans for town house style apartments that can go from a duplex to 12 units.

-Grant H.Photo showing small gap between dwellingsPhoto showing the "connector" inside this small gap between the dwellingsBlue outline: Townhomes/condo style dwellings.Orange outline: Completely separate single-family dwellingsRed outline: Two properties pictured in the first photo above