My concern for you is that you seem to be trying to force something to happen and that can lead to a decision you regret down the road.

Don't bet on passive appreciation, just forced appreciation.

Nothing feels forced.

The app doesn't allow rent by room, so I am sort of forcing it.

In the end I was forced into the HELOC.

You do not "learn more" with a duplex or quad that will help you get into 20+ units, then you can learn from a SFR, other than you will be forced to deal with more tenants, faster, which, I guess, is learning a lot about what owning property is like.

The key is knowing how to force a seller to comply with the agreement.

😂Plenty of lovely folks there, plus it's where Cannon Air Force Base is located, but we soon discovered that just having a base nearby didn't necessarily make for a lively real estate market.Shortly after that, we adopted our MUCHAS criteria:M - Near a military baseU - Has at least one college or universityC - Has a Costco or equivalentH - Has a hospital ranked at least as a Level II Trauma CenterA - Has a commercial airportS - Has a Sprouts (organic grocery) or equivalentThis has led us to look at often-overlooked markets like Lubbock, Texas and Augusta, Georgia.May be worth a look for you as well!

We have found that setting our expectations about what we want is helpful (financial performance, level of renovation we can handle, forced equity opportunities, number of bedrooms, etc) and then waiting for a deal to materialize. 

Mine are still young where I don't want to force direction but rather see how they react to things.