In addition, my many years in the mortgage industry provided great real estate financial knowledge and access to capital.

You need to ask your lawyer unless a lawyer from your state is willing to give advice on line. 

Good day BP family, I am grateful to be apart of this vast online mastermind.

I've got access to cash for emergency repair fund. 

I just received this info from a realtor and I have not done multi family yet but I do know it is accessed differently.    

Or do you mean that you have equity in your home that you need to access in some way to then use for down payments and closing costs?

These steps are the only access to a 2nd floor small 300-ish sqft apartment.

However; what you can do is look up the number of permits that are pulled from the building department, most cities have that online now. 

With technology being so prevalent, is it impossible to find and close on a deal completely online while only using a friend to view the property (for due diligence purposes) in the area where the deal is located?

I've read online that you can further reduce the capital gain by adding others to the ownership.