Help with determining strength of a rental market in relatively unknown area?

[James G.]

I have been considering a few buy and hold properties in some areas that I am not too familiar with. I am doing my homework on these particular areas and trying to pick apart each aspect of the numbers. However, I could use some suggestions on how to determine the strength of the rental market in a given area? I have called a few local real estate agents and tried to pick their brain on how the rental market was as well as looking on Zillow to see how many rentals were available in these areas. It would be great to hear from some others whose primary focus is long Term Rentals and who have ventured into areas that they are all not too familiar with and how you went about determining if there was a good rental market. Thank you in advance.