What Markets should I be afraid of?

[Adrie Moses-bailey]

Hey guys, I am a newbie from NYC looking to do my first deal trying to build Cash flow.I realize I live in literally the second or third worst place in the country for that! I have been crawling the MLS in my local market and the minute I see a potential deal its gone. I have not tried looking offmarket through direct mail at this point. I did however figure that I might be better off looking in other markets where the numbers make better sense. So I went ahead and pulled up some statistics of metro areas with numbers that make more sense but I am finding a lot of markets where, while the prices should make sense for purchase, there are worrying signs like decreasing population and falling home values. My question then is how do you guys do market research and what sort of criteria do you look for, should I care about population trends and such things?