You are going to be tested on this tomorrow....

There is usually a missed opportunity in most markets delivering housing products that are needed but not readily available and the Zillow data most rely upon does not tell this story.Get to know the members of a community, their needs, what steers them away from the housing that's currently available.

It's good to test things and see what works for you and what doesn't.

In that situation I purchased a SF property 4 hours away from me this year as a fix-n-flip and to test the hypothesis that long distance fix-n-flips could be viable investments. 

I also like to cross-reference that data with Facebook marketplace, craigslist, Zillow and apartments.com listings to get a really good idea of expectations for rent in a specific area.

Brian Davis: @Eric LoweThere's a company called Rental Property Refund that does cost segregation studies virtually, based on self-reported data from you.

Just go through them, select the renovated/closely matching ones, and enter them into a model.Here's my fix & flip model, you can see the comps entered and some quick stats below them: Then I use that comp data to adjust the Sale Price in the model to what I estimate it will be (double check the resale $/sf is in-line with the comps), then adjust the purchase price until I hit my desired return level. 

I'm skeptical but I'm willing to test the water to something small first.

If I see this data Cleveland Income is similar to your zip code but home price is 3x difference.

In response, I had a plumber and a water restoration company come to assess the situation.The restoration company cut into the drywall, and the plumber thoroughly inspected all the pipes, performed a leak test, and conducted a pressure test.