First time investor - looking at Sherman/Denison,TX?

[Taylor Martel]

Hi All:

I just moved to North Texas and am trying to acclimate myself with the different areas in order to select a good place to invest. I'm looking at buy and hold SF properties and would like to spend about $200,000 (give or take a little) where I can force about 10-20% appreciation with some repairs (changing dining room to bedroom/cosmetic things - no foundation work). I was initially looking at garland/irving/richardson but realize that unless I have all cash, investments in these area's may be very difficult to attain. A Realtor recently suggested the Denison/Sherman area which I started looking into and noticed that the housing prices are definitely within reach, and the rents seem to be high enough to balance and even provide a good cash-on-cash return. In comparison to the rest of north Texas, the area hasn't seemed to appreciate as rapidly but definitely has been stable throughout the past 10 years. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this area or suggestions for other areas that would meet my criteria. I'm looking to buy 2 investment properties/year and want to make sure to be profiting from them, but given that this is my first one -  I just want to make sure I can break even!

Thanks so much, your input is appreciated.

Taylor