Closed March 4th on the duplex, renovated the lower unit, advertised it and sifted through multiple tenants and I believe to have found a winner.  

You just can't sift or police jerks, it comes with bearing your questions for a bunch of people to reply to.

I’m an out of state investor and after some market research and sifting through BP threads have decided to get into the Kansas City market.

You get so much useful information in the list they provide.The list may have 4000 properties like my county would have.One useful thong you can sift through at the county office is if the certified letters where signed for or if they came back in received.This may indicate an owner that the county can't locate to inform them they may be losing their property.

My concern with this is, I don't want them to be in a pre-2008 scenario to where the value of their property drops 25-40% a yer or two after they buy and then they get stuck.However, with the same token, my other concern is that as we sift through properties, prices keep going up.

Let's look at finding deals . . . . . . . for single and  multifamily1)  Track listings on MLS (being your own agent is helpful so you can act fast, but not for everyone)2) For multi family, I would also watch LoopNet or Costar3) get on a lot of wholesalers list and sift through the junk to find the gem 4) Attend local REIA meetings and get to know the players and let them get to know you, they might have a pocket listing.5) Direct mail potential sellers in areas you want to buy -  - code violation lists (I send about 1000 pieces of mail a month)- probate (or even obit records for all deceased owners of property) - look for deceased owners of duplexes and send letters- direct mail probate attorneys who might have families dealing with rental properties- direct mail nursing homes - caseworkers who help families transition- farm specific areas where you want to buy and direct mail the absentee owners.- know of a group of properties you would really like, keep telling the owners of your desire to buy and when they sell, they will call you first (most good duplexes sell this way to friends or contacts that connected with the owner) they don't often get listed for sale, they sell to family or friends.

Once you get an idea of what type of RE investment suits your needs (ie. financial standing, time constraints, risk tolerance, etc.) then the amount of information you need to sift through and absorb will be greatly diminished.

I guess I would really have to sift through those and who's really interested before I could organize this.  

If you don't have the time or inclination to start marketing to motivated sellers and sifting through the results and negotiating, you may still be able to get a great deal on an REO or a wholesale deal - buy from someone who has done that work to get a property under contract at a great price, then just pay them for that piece of the work.

While I can manipulate the data using the basic filters, there is still a considerable amount of sifting through dated postings that are no longer current or available.Has anyone else experienced this, or found a better way?