These malls took out Mom/Pop local stores. 

Instead of throwing your deal out to a bunch of strangers on the internet, I recommend you do your research to find a local expert with 20+ ACTIVE years in real estate in your market.

Before you jump into some type of mentorship (that they usually want you to pay for), I would start doing some meetups in your area with local real estate investors. 

Would real estate prices in certain regions rise rapidly due to demand from both local and international buyers? 

You’ll want to check if your specific work falls under their home improvement contractor licensing, or if there are additional local permits required depending on the county.

Find someone local or who specializes in working with investors.

network with local agents to see where they took theres. but not much to it but go with who you feel comfortable with.

I spoke to the local fire chief.

Now when your agent actually does the release then they send it to the listing agent and its is the listing agents responsibility to forward that doc to the sellers we do this all the time via docu sign or hello sign or whatever on line document system the local MLS uses.. somehow you seem to have this backwards..

Next piece of advice is shop this deal around with someone through the forums or local real estate groups (google for your area).