Thought it was a safe first investment, instead of flipping or fixing with no prior experience.

I am glad you landed in a safe location at least temporarily. 

People like to ridicule what they don't understand, but when the government inflates the dollar away, or taxes whats hiding in your safe deposit box, or we do a bank bail-in like Cyprus did, THEN maybe some people will bother to read a few articles and learn about Bitcoin.   

the market is unforgiving right now, and if you buy a random property by looking on Zillow and turn it over to people you don't know to manage, you'll lose money.with respect to your specific question, if the property is safe, clean, and priced correctly, it will rent. but that doesn't mean you'll make money on it. 

To replace the roof on a home with solar panels, to maintain the solar panel warranty, you will need to use their company to remove the panels, store them safely during roof work, and then use their company to replace the panels and make sure they are working again.

Most importantly you can refine your phone technique at a low cost.

I'm familiar with Avalon and Riverside and would like to know if there are any other good areas to consider that are safe and have good schools nearby.

Like you, i'd be interested if anyone here has any experience with doing this 'technique'. 

There are old style martial arts that are outdated for todays times and then there are progressive martial arts that use techniques for real world self defense.No legal advice given.         

I’m just trying to play it as safe as possible considering it’s been vacant for so long and I have no idea the condition in which the previous owner left things.