You have to wade through all the junk to get to the relatively rare diamond in the rough.

I listened to the Bob Diamond webinar on bankruptcies and I'm curious as to how the system works.

Black Diamond in Waltham is great..Also look on Meetup.com for "Real Estate Investors of Metro West" and "Boston Real Estate Connection".

Best local meeting to check out is the Black Diamond meeting in Waltham (2nd meeting in Worcester), you will learn a lot and meet lots of great people.  

As @Alan Diamond mentioned do not plan on any appreciation in house value, and slow appreciation in rental rates, but things are very predictable in Rochester as evidenced by the last real estate crash that did not affect our market in any significant manner.  

On FCI's Diamond notes (the one's that they service), does one assume that a workout was unsuccessful and that FC is the only exit strategy?

New England REIA in Chelmsford is mostly no selling, you'll meet 30-40 people with lots of newbies and some regular experienced people@Justin Silverio runs a meetup that is free, I don't know what his attendance is, but he'll jump in and tell usMy Black Diamond is also free and meets next Tuesday, link in my profile. 

diamonds in your backyard 🏦

Like in any area its best to look around and test the different brokers to find the diamond in the pile of lazies, who don't already have a stable of investors.Its rough.As far as G.C.'

Closest ones to you would be the Boston Area REIA (Just changed locations to Medford) and the Black Diamond REI meeting in Waltham run by @Ann Bellamy .