You'd have to find a house to rent by the room or try another zip code.

So that in the event you want to do it yourself with permits or contractors are not available in a timely manner you can do it yourself do it right and get it done and move on to the next opportunity.NC LAW snippet:A person may construct or alter a building on land owned by that person without having a general contractor’s license so long as the building is intended solely for occupancy by the owner and his family AND the owner obtains all required permits.

This is a health code violation.

Any recommendations on where/what zip codes have more this kind of properties?

Decided/approved by the law makers and added to the Internal Revenue Code.  

I know this because I took the course to get my professional home inspectors license and we learned how everything is built to code.

Plus it sounds like one of the realtors was more interested in “taking it off your hands” than listing it (pretty sure that violated their code of ethics…but I digress)

Do you focus on high potential like pre-foreclosures, and potentially cover a large area (multiple zip codes)?

Usually, code violations or lack of permitting, but they can really add up if all renovations or upgrades over time were done without permits.

Yeah.. well that just blatantly says they will act in contradiction to the Realtor Code of Ethics on a number of fronts for starters.The buyer's agent is working for you whereas the listing agent work for the seller.