How to select state / county /city to invest in SFR (buy and hold

[Dror Levy]

Hello all,

For some time I'm following on the real estate investment discussions here in BP. 

Have decided to dip my toes in the water in the form of "turn key" for a buy and hold for now.

Wanted to get ideas and learn on how people go about selecting the area to invest in. Any key criteria you have established? Web sites that you use to gather information and understand trends etc.  

I would imagine eventually it all comes to the specifics of the property itself but then the search is becoming to exhaustive, so I would want to focus on couple geographical areas and be able to search there.

Currently I'm in CA and looking to invest in other states.

Any idea on how to get started and get focused on an area would be appreciated.

Thanks in advace to all the comments.