Your rank and annual income will dictate how much a lender will offer you.

Virginia is a great place to get cashflowing assets that you can sell to those with VA Loans, for every one military member that leaves one of equal or greater rank will replace them and most of the time they will pick the homes that is the most updated and offers the most convenience to base amenities.

Unlike leads you can order online from a generic website, I can guarantee that the leads I pull are fresh (60 days or less), off market, and I use a ranking system to determine which sellers are most motivated based off of factors such as the executor of the property living in a different state and the amount of siblings the house has been inherited by.

Most of the articles and reports I read rank it as a good place to invest, but the taxes and Insurance are rather high to me.

I have got my website ranked in top of google (doesn't mean much), I've created connections and networked within my local market (Tallahassee FL) attracting both cash buyers and motivated sellers.

Philadelphia’s Growing PopulationCurrently ranked as the 5th largest city in the country by population, Philadelphia’s population has grown consistently year over year since 2006.

@Justin Rank Thank you.  

If you are good at it, you will rank #1 on Google, and when that happens you get a ton of leads for free (if your site is credible as well).No worries.

Regarding your property price, this would tend to leave you in the lower ranking areas of Bakersfield for a value add property, or potentially a much more finished property out in Taft, but the trade off would mainly be the size of population you have to pull from when renting the property.  

Amazon has both books ranked with 5-star reviews from 87% and 85% of purchasers respectively, so it's not a question of 'which book is better', I don't believe.