@Chris VonCannon , welcome to the site, a great place to be and learn a lot, here in Charlotte we are doing really good, its booming and a lot of opportunities if you know what you are doing.As @Chris T. 

I'm not too concerned about layoffs in our area due to the booming construction going on locally in the refinerys. 

Most of the books you want are outdated because they talk about how it was during the housing boom or they are motivational, hype you up, get up and do it types with no clear instruction on how to execute.

Also, you can call tax collector to validate if it's zoned properly, before you make an offer.

It's a lot scarier shopping around for a first house than shopping around for my first boom box when I was a kid.  

I have a trash collector coming to broom-clean the garage in a week or two. 

They may tell you theyre having an issue with deal flow.......boom then comes opportunity.

Boom, that's a minute.

Illinois is a booming market for solar, you have great interconnection, net metering, and SREC policies there. 

Many of the big box companies hire anyone, put them through a few weeks of training and boom, they're certified to file your taxes.