Please help me find a better way

[Brian Davis]

Good Day BP,

I am new to the website and have been learning all I can while I become more and more eager to begin my investing journey out of state. I am trying to be careful not to 'waste' anyone's time unnecessarily, so I am trying to take on the daunting task of researching for my own potential brrrr properties in areas I'm unfamiliar with. I am asking for guidance or tips to help expedite or find more efficient/accurate results.  Here is what I've been doing...

I am trying to find my niche in the market and have several areas I'm looking into. So I choose an area, let's say Pensacola, FL, and open up realtordotcom to begin checking for 3bd/2ba fixer upper homes. Once I find a couple potentials, I open up zillowdotcom and plug in those addresses to see what the nearby homes are listed as. This is beginning to frustrate me because the listed homes nearby are very close in value to the potentially distressed property and I'm not able to follow a clear guide on the 70% rule.

A few questions to help me understand this better...Is this an okay strategy on performing my own research or is this pretty useless and going to end up frustrating me (as it seems to be doing)? Because these listed homes have been on the market for days and weeks, is that perhaps a reason why my numbers aren't jiving (because if they were, other investors would have already picked them up? In order to accomplish a good brrrr investment, will I be forced to seek out the core 4 and try to jump on properties as they hit the mls or before?

I am trying to do all my own research so I can potentially find my niche area to invest in before I go wasting agent's time on the phones.  I thank you all in advance for your advice and/tips on how to improve my research.