I know DFD does not scale, but by driving I will become intimate with each town.

My wife and I made a decision to look for scale with our next acquisition after investing in small duplexes and SFR.

Couple questions:1 - one of the biggest "regrets" posted is that people didn't scale faster. 

Or you could sell these properties and make, let's say, 30k on each of them and actually roll that into an investment that cash flows properly as a 20% downpayment.The key to success in this game is in scale, not in discounts.

Hard money can be a great option and help you scale once you know what you are doing. 

I know there's a lot of factors involved in determining a market's desirability for investments, but on a very basic scale, is finding historical data that reveals such strong metrics in a market a sign to invest, or does it signal that the market is now hot?

Furthermore, if you wanted to start smaller scale, you could find a person that you already know well and contribute to a project that they will run and manage (smaller than a syndication).

evicted all tenants, don't have capital to make improvements so I am putting it on the market and scaling down to a single fam.

Third, and maybe most important, what you learn now, is what will allow you to scale when opportunities present themselves. 

If scaling is your main goal why not buy bigger properties and put 3-4 or 10 families under one roof with one booking instead of 10?