The good news is that once you gain traction you can hire a VA to cold call for you and then just talk to the most motivated sellers.

It takes a while to gain traction, then it starts to grow exponentially.

This business will certainly have both acceleration and traction from day 1! 

I can't believe it's 3 years later and this thread still has traction. 

At times I've even had to bring in a genealogist, BUT it was absolutely worth it because these were home deals.If you're a new investor struggling to get that first deal or to get any traction, don't get overwhelmed, get TARGETED.  

BNBCal is becoming quite popular as well but is just now gaining traction and it's not clear how they're pulling data.

If you're dialing 100+ people a day and not coming out with 2-3 solid conversations per day after a week, then change the tools, but in my experience its usually the skill of the caller, so get dialing because the only way to get better is through practice.The good news: once you get some traction and close deals, you can hire a VA cold caller to do most of the grunt work and focus on the handraisers and nurturing them.

Could be worth listing and seeing what kind of traction or interest you get. 

I personally learned by trial and error as you suggested, but it took years to get any traction and I could have definitely been way ahead if I have leveraged the ability to learn from others who had successfully made it before me.

I would recommend looking inland and stay ahead of the curve, maybe areas like Lakeland that has really gained traction in the last couple of years, much more affordable and still lots of land (not landlocked by an ocean...)