The equity potential of course, but mainly I was trying to solve two issues - on one end, the seller was struggling financially and needed to sell her home but investors were aggressively trying to take advantage.

house hacking is the best way to get started, period.in each of the above - do more than the person who wants to call 1 lender and go to 1 meeting and look at 3 potential house hacks. 

In-house construction, converted an 87,000 sf vacant KMart to Class A climate controlled self storage in Reidsville, NC, then 8 more projects What was the outcome?

However, just on the basis of time value if money, I would be reluctant to invest any money with no return to potentially have return in the future when further work is done.  

What many investors are learning is that this leads to terrible outcomes including paused distributions and loss of principal invested.You are technically correct that debt will always multiply returns.

Really new to this and not sure where to start but see the value and potential of real estate investing and want to start.

One popular option is multifamily syndication, which has a lot of potential for scaling up.

What was the outcome?

Not only can you find potential properties, you can do a lot of research in there as well. 

I would recommend focusing on the education piece right now, doing research, and potentially signing up for a program so you can learn more about how real estate properties are taxed.