All Forum Posts by: David Shull

@Michael David Pagan - those resources are super helpful, thank you! I had briefly looked at Dept of Numbers and City Data but the bestplaces.net site is new to me! Looks very helpful. I'm finding the same challenges where, especially for smaller cities, there doesn't seem to be a wealth of data. 

I have had a particularly hard time finding a vacancy rate that I trust. Does anyone in the BP community have suggestions on how to estimate that? 

@Dylan Vargas - Great to meet you! Thanks so much for the reply! That makes sense re: California. Especially the flip part. I guess I'm just worried that with my travel schedule (I'm on the road a lot for work) that I wouldn't have the time and ability to be there in-person. It seems possible to manage a flip remotely, but as a first-time investor, it seems like it would leave a lot more room for mistakes that may be avoidable with more experience. 

I'm thinking of the Midland area, but @Kevin L. 's post (thank you, Kevin!) made me realize I have some more research to do on that front. Midland has a stable economy but it's heavily reliant on a single employer (Dow Chemical) which has been less than stable. 

Really appreciate the help! 

Hi BiggerPockets community! My name is David and very new to the real-estate investing game. My goal is to purchase my first property this year and am diving headfirst into learning as much as I can ahead of my first trial run. 

I'm currently based in San Francisco but from Michigan originally. Given the high barrier of entry in California I'm thinking of investing remotely in Michigan. I feel I know more (though not a lot) about that market compared to starting from scratch. 

Here is my question for the community - what factors do you look at when evaluating the health of a market from afar? 

So far, I've been looking Zillow, Trulia, etc at housing prices and comparing that with rental properties. I feel like this gives me a good gut feel of the market but it also feels like there is more I should be doing to learn about the long-term health of the market. 

Maybe I'm over thinking this?