Listen, I like real estate - I've owned multiple homes over the years and did pretty well (except during the early 90's). But I think it's not realistic to think that there are predictable 'higher appreciation areas'. Consider your 4% vs. 11% example. That's a differential of 7%, which would mean that the same $ investment in the 11% area would roughly double the value of the 4% area investment every 10 years. Over 50 years, that would be roughly a factor of 32!
So think about this - let's say you thought a certain area in Hawaii could predictably run 11% appreciation, and a certain area in Kansas City could predictably run 4% appreciation. Let's say you start with a home in Hawaii at $1,000,000, and a home in KC at $200,000, so the Hawaii home is 5 times the value of the KC home. In 50 years, you're saying the place in Hawaii would be worth 5*32=160 times the place in KC. That's exceeding difficult to believe.
It's even crazier if you work it backwards - the same assumptions would mean that, 50 years ago, the home in Hawaii was worth 5/32=.15 times the place in KC (otherwise it couldn't be worth 5 times the value now).