For those of you familiar with ground rent, I could use your thoughts.

Denver is a reasonably safe city compared to many and our public transit is finally catching up, albeit slowly.

On the ground level as I am-it’s obvious.

 Get at least three different estimates from different contractors that way you can compare their prices.

Me and my family own 160 acres of wheat ground in northern Oklahoma that is only paying around $8k per year in cash rent (before taxes). 

If it’s the right relationship, that year compared to a life long foundation for financial freedom means nothing.

You can still take the majority of all the cash or even more (comparable to profit in flips) you have invested in the property bought, not pay any taxes on the "profit" and cash, and  also invest the profit and cash in another deal.

Compared to California everything is cheap.

I say possibly because the particular neighborhood has some pretty wild price swings on seemingly comparable houses (I mean swings of 100% ore more!). 

That being said, with multifamily properties (at least with those over a couple units), the value is derived from the cap rate (net income / Price) as how that compares to similar multifamily properties nearby.