However these are probably not move in ready, so you might have to do renovations and you don't recover that.HOA liens are risky and you likely get wiped out at some point.I'd say mitigate your risk by NOT buying condo foreclosures, but neighborhood HOA foreclosures where the HOA dues are more like 400-$600/year, so maybe you pick these up for $1500 and live in a $300,000-$400,000 house for a year rent free. 

For starters, I'd recommend looking in gentrifying, developing neighborhoods.

Try looking into zillow/Redfin and see what your potential rents you can get near the neighborhood by filtering the bedrooms/bathrooms of the intentional property that you are planning to buy.

Depending on the neighborhood, condition of the property, etc.

If you are constantly loan shopping you will pretty much end up at square one.

I’d prefer to sell out right (get the higher price from an owner occupant.) and then just move in to a true rental in the same neighborhood.  

The realtor I saw in a local coffee shop new me as we had worked together previoulsy.

I rather pay a bit more in the beginning and have a lower vacancy rate in a good neighborhood than a cheaper priced home that takes a few months to rent.Good luck. 

Any advice on which neighborhoods are great for investing is greatly appreciated.

The median price points she showed me were on the higher side $330,000 to $470,000 depending on the county but you could probably find lower priced properties (I don't invest in Atlanta so I don't know the breakdown of neighborhoods).