Alternatively I can you let us know the street address and I can tell you what to expect tenant-wise. 

This sounds like a "blind fund" - but what's the alternative?

In our area, that's one of the best alternatives.

I’m not knocking the technique at all.

But would be interested/grateful for any tips/tricks/techniques you could provide about next steps I should take; e.g., finding a lender to get a constructions loan, finding an architect to design 4-plex, dealing w/ city bureaucracy moving forward, etc.

There are tons of marketing techniques to counter that. 

Hello, I am looking for a research tool that is affordable and will provide important market research data for the areas I am looking at investing in. An ideal search tool would include market growth and the ability t...

An alternative to selling could be to refinance those properties which you currently own outright, and then use the cash from the refinance for the down-payment on a multifamily property.

with out suggesting alternative markets .. 

And is this the technique that leads people to come up with nonsense escape clauses, like John mentioned,  which screw over not only the homeowner but people like myself trying to deal in honest transactions?