Living in an expensive area...where should I invest?

[Jennifer Nguyen]

Hi! I'm a real estate newbie and interested in investing in "buy and hold" real-estate, preferably a SFR in the 80k price range. Where I'm at in So Cal, the cheapest homes are 400-500k and even if I go East of my location it's still in the 250k range. What would be the next step? Invest out of state? It's a bit overwhelming trying to pick a random starting point since within my radius I haven't been able to find a deal in the price range I'm looking for.