If looking for appreciation buy in upcoming neighborhoods or those on the outskirts of established neighborhoods or places where the transportation is about to expand to.5.If buying a home that was previously owned get a recommended engineer to be your inspector that can tell you how much it will cost to repair. 

Close to public transportation and all services.  

Black mountain will get improved infrastructure in the form of roadways, public transport, and retail/commercial space.

Think rust belt to sun belt (a super cycle), think east/west coast high company costs looking to relocate to Dallas to reduce employee costs and be close to key strategic transportation routes (DFW, interstates) linking coast to coast in a few hours.The long term trend of more renters has a lot of legs left (millennials, boomers), cost of a house is going up as well as higher rates so that will continue to keep people renting as well.  

We do have a lot of class "C" and even more class "D", but what else do you expect in a blue collar town driven by blue collar warehouse and transportation type jobs.

Southside ("flats" and "slopes" simply denote if you are located on the flat part or hill part of Southside, it's all the same neighborhood though) is across the river, you can't walk but it's a short drive and there is public transportation, also a lot of college rentals here.

If you look at crude oil it is back to $70 bbl and Iranian embargo all have an effect on transportation cost as Americans use home delivery more and more often putting shopping center out of business.  

It's my understanding a sober house is totally unregulated in the Lone Star State.

At least they're not demanding grass (or other things) for transportation.

Bakersfield is projected to 3x growth in the next 10-15 years, and is now being discovered by the MNC's as the transportation hub of CA.