Are the development savings, mildly better overall rent, and safety of having multiple units to rent under one roof, better then the possible appreciation bonus on a SFR? 

The interest rates of many residential Fannie and Freddie loans (ARM's) as well as numerous types of commercial loans are based off LIBOR plus a spread.  

Inflation is good for investors, it's bad for savers.If you buy another owner occupied proeprty in CO you can fund it with very little down, I have a lender here in Milwaukee who does 5% down with no PMI on 5 year ARMs for OO - in house portfolio loan.Also agree very much with Corina, don't count on the light rail until they break ground, or at least fully funded and signed off.

You might not be required to update it - check with your local building dept to find out what code is - but you might want to anyway just for safety as a landlord.

Lately, I allow my money to marinate in properties owned for cash and index funds out of safety and then I play in stocks for fun and use my line of credit to do my flips.

Anything less than assessed value needs documentation it is a bona fide,  arms length transaction.   

I bought property in BC and did extremely well with it.. both in the Currency arbitrage and massive appreciation.. not to mention safety US like banking I got bank loans at owner occ rates.. granted had to put more down..

I do residential loans; haven't done an ARM in over a year b/c of the inverted yield curve that started about a year and a half ago (google search "what does an inverted yield curve predict?"

When I make an offer on a property I use another RE broker to submit the offer to present an arms length transaction.

I'll see that you're not getting a good deal and I'll arm you with information that you'll use to renegotiate the numbers.