Or would it make more sense to buy the multifamily and re-sell for a profit and use those profits to buy my first rental?

How can would you make this deal work from a profitability? 

If you can partner with someone that has a contractors license, you may be able to obtain private money or sell the opportunty for a share of the profit or for a flat fee in escrow. 

A better way with single family homes is to buy them and then become a "lease option" owner who does financing to good people that have not qualified with a Bank and do not know about the alternatives and they will usually take better care of the home because they think they will own some day, collect a larger non-refundable deposit, the monthly spread between your payment and the rent during that period, and then make money on the sale option.  9 times out of 10 they usually do not purchase the home but you can do it again.

Im looking to purchase a larger multifamily of 50+ units and my searches keep coming back to do syndication.

Progress payments to be made upon your inspection and approval, holding out at least 10% until final inspection and approval of any permits, and 30 days after completion or until unconditional lien releases are submitted for all subs and materials for which preliminary 30 day notices have been filed.In larger time sensitive projects you can also negotiate for of a performance bond which would compensate you for failure to complete the project on time and to the specifications in the contract.Always check the status of the contractors license with your state contractors licensing agency and verify that the guy signing the contract actually is the contractor whose license is being provided.

You'll also have to think about how you want to split profits and losses between the two of you if one of you is fronting cash and the other is fronting services. 

Inventory stays forever on the market in smaller markets and if you're going the HML route, the interest costs will eat into your profits in no time.Don't view a market as expensive or cheap purely based on the average price of a property.

I always have my investors do at least a 7-10 day inspection period just in case we need to re-negotiate on the price after the contractor reviews the property.Once my contractor looks at the property they can kinda tell me what they think is going on with the property and also give me an estimate on re-hab costs we like to make sure the numbers make sense there is a certain profit margin we need to make on every deal.

After being an active broker for 30+ years, I would encourage you to become a licensed agent and then broker.The experience of inspecting many properties on a daily basis, learning the listing as well as the selling side will only up your game when it comes to negotiating with a seller who's property you want to buy.Some of my best and most profitable 'flips' were because I went out on a listing call, knew the property values and was first on the scene.