This is a single family in a fantastic school district the house is large and nice we actually used to live in it.

The home is in a desirable area in a highly desirable school district but the owners simply don't care for the home.

I have the VA loan at my disposal and am targeting small MFH in better school districts (considering Loyalsock, Montoursville, and South WIlliamsport)  as I would like to house-hack and will have kindergartner next year.

Garner covers Wake county and Johnston county, and your school district may explain rental demand some too.

It is a family friend and they are looking to sell, it needs a major rehab on the entire property but my wife likes the location(about a block from our pastor’s house) and in the school district she teaches in.

The Torrance ADU development standard states "ADUs are not allowed in the Hillside Overlay or Local Coastal Overlay District unless the ADU is created from converting existing permitted square footage," which I assume are the areas you're talking about.

District court would likely say you do not. 

@Raymond Hill my sense is that due to the various costs and regulations involved, as @Brandon Ingegneri mentioned in his examples, it just makes more economic sense for builders to focus on single families than multis.I think it's related to the fact that most single family purchases don't make sense from an investment point of view because as an investor who's looking at income and expense #s to determine what you can offer, you're competing with owner-occupants who have very favorable financing and are buying because of the school district and because they like the kitchen and bathroom, not whether the rents vs. expenses & mortgage is profitable.In other words, because of the favorable financing and "use benefit", the buyers of single families almost always pay more per unit than the buyers of multi families.

School districts probably won't be the best in the areas you'll get the most ROIWhere do you work?

But in the San Gabriel Valley area, that might be tough as duplexes for sale in areas with quality school district often go over 1 million dollars.