With that being said, if there are any agents or investors located in Western NY willing to let me learn from them, or simply learn more about them, I am willing to work something out and/or possibly work for free.

Remember, for any claim, if you can just find one case where that proposed claim does not work it is enough to prove that claim is false.So consider this.They it was told toy uo by others is inherently flawed simply by this fact:If I give you a list of 18 year old people that don't own a house... and that list is 2000 contacts large, how many deals are you going to make?

and are you looking to walk away with cash or simply refinance (meaning paying off) what you owe? 

The biggest form of energy production in Tennessee today, nuclear power, simply wouldn't exist without many, many trillions in tax dollars to develop, not to mention the government stepping up to insure and protect the plants, manage and protect the waste for half an eternity, and clean up the trillion dollar mess in case of another disaster.

Simply put, many of these distressed properties were put under duress by the former owners financially, not necessarily the location.

There simply are too many people attempted to get their hands in our pockets. 

I have some who will simply lend 100% of PP and 100% of Rehab  up to 70-75% of ARV in parts of the midwest and SE - feel free to shoot me a DM and we can discuss! 

So maybe this simply won't work. 

The way wholesalers get around this is by claiming to simply be marketing the contract and not the property itself (hard to do legally), or by doing a double close (buying the property then reselling it immediately).

I wouldn't invest in MA or NY, simply because of their eviction laws.