Small towns should have every aspect looked at with scrutiny even more so than big metro areas. 

Initial signs point to these areas as being healthy opportunities as long as the right deals are found but it would be extremely helpful to hear more about the cash-flow opportunity (as population growth may be driving up prices), if this area was hot a few years ago and may be cooling down and any other market-specific aspects that I may be missing/not including in my research.Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

In my opinion you need to find a property manager who you trust or you need to manage the aspect of choosing which tenants will be placed.

As far as finding out who the city planner is to discuss the legal aspects of that is it just as easy as googling city planner of city "x" or is their a specific site you would recommend?

It provides a lot of good info on one (very important) aspect of note investing. 

I would value your expertise in the business in all aspects of RE and would seek to partner with someone like you to help us both.

Hi, First of all i would like to say hello to all BP users and thank you for giving me this platform to increase all aspects of my knowledge with people who have been there and done it.I am Rebecca, 26 from Ireland.

I also hit up individual investors in that market and start building relationships with them - they can help with all aspects - choosing people, neighborhoods, etc. and may eventually feed you deals. 

I love the physical aspect of real estate and how progress can be actually observed.

If you're fine renting to either, then you're set either way.