Susan your cardinal points are off a little  39209 is WEST Jackson and your correct that is the worst part of town. 

Your engineer or surveyor or town planning personnel should be able to give some idea of the timeline to having approval and a building permit.

He left town.

I wanted to know what are some good neighborhoods on the outskirts of town. 

The property is in I would say a C+/B- part of town. 

And I get it; living in a small town means these are people I’ll be seeing all the time anyway, so making peace with that is part of the game.

What town is the property in? 

The section of Nashville over by Jefferson Street IS a very hit or miss area but the nice thing about it is that it's directly adjacent to some very nicer areas of town like downtown, Germantown, the gulch, etc.

I have a salitle  office over on that side of town and the city is getting ready to dump alot of money into the area of town.The Decade before it A maybe  in real time is over five under 8.There so much development that is getting ready to take place in that area that is taking place.

I recently found a wholesaler who presented a sub to wrap around through a Facebook page in my home town-which is what I prefer due to the proximity to my primary residence.