I know North Corona is a desirable area.

South of the 101 freeway, prices are a bit lower and not as desirable, although some agents or websites would call it Echo Park, it's actually Historic Filipino Town, which is very different...there are high-end rental developments coming up on Temple tbough. 

Midwood is lovely in its own right but just outside the "very desirable" area.

I am completely new to Real Estate Investing but have a huge passion and desire to get involved.

@Gamble LiAround here (Fredericton), the inventory on 6-10 unit buildings is pretty tight  - though there are a couple for sale at the moment in a part of the City that is a little less desirable.  

The flipping involves everything from finding the property, negotiating the deal, determining what needs to be done to the property, dealing with the renovation planning to include getting it approved by the local authorities, performing the work on the property or finding and supervising the contractors or employees who will do the work on the property, paying all associated bills for the property to include HOA fees, utilities, insurance, and taxes, coordinating all aspects of the rehab which goes beyond just hiring contractors, passing all inspections, staging the property, determining sales price at completions (which may be different than initial ARV projection), staging the property (if desired), finding and supervising the realtor selling the property.  

An issue here is that being new to the industry, my imagination for possible scenarios leaves something to be desired (and hopefully something I can improve on in this forum).

I found this incredible duplex that's close Universities, Downtown and it's about a mile to a very highly desired area.

I think with your desire to only have a few properties with very low leverage and possibly using a lease option as your exit plan, you should consider paying a little more for a 3/2 that can cash flow better than $200/mo and is in a slightly better location.

I say that because some of the podcasts are geared towards types of investing that I have no desire in, find your niche of what you want to do and listen to some podcasts and read as many books on the subject as possible.