I live an hour and 20 minutes from the closest property and 18 hours (drive) from the other two.  

Also Jim maybe we can work on doing a BiggerPockets meet up in Swansboro that is the closest thing the middle between Jacksonville, New Bern, Morehead City, and Havelock.

There isn't a REIA terribly close to me to find wholesalers to talk to (Wareham I think is the closest), so I've been looking for bank foreclosures, online auctions, and Short sales primarily.  

Your looking like a T-Bone steak my friend!  

My husband, daughter and I are looking to move to Minneapolis spring 2017 and house hack a duplex with at least 3 beds or a single family home with a basement or attic to rent out.We are looking in the Coon Rapids area which will be closest to my husbands new job and want to try to do some smaller renovations before we rent out the other unit on the property and other renovations along the way so we can refinance and then move on to our next property in 2-3 years.Any recommendations for real estate agents, mortgage lenders who could help with my non existing credit score at the moment, and any GC recommendations would be great, landlord tips, etc would be super helpful!

This is a NEEDS Driven Business - When someone NEEDS Storage, they do a Google Search, and find the closest facility.  

You Should get some references and not from Their family members and Their closest friends.

EXAMPLE: You're trying to get comps on your HUD MH in and around the SFR's the home is located in that are worth 250k, However, because it's a HUD MH the appraiser has no choice but to refer to the nearest HUD MH in the area which is can be the closest HUD MHP where the values are less than 100k.

Keep in mind there are not many parks around here, and the one closest i can think of is not in a good area for kids (school wise) and the others are owned and managed by a realty group that sells/rents them also, so i assumed not a good place to try to start out. 

If the property (for example) you’re interested in is a 3bed/2bath with garage, and basement, that’s 1500sqft, built in 2001, located on Main St, you want to compare that to the most recent sales of homes that are 3bed/2bath with garage, and basement, that’s nearest to 1500sqft, built as close to 2001 as possible, in the closest vicinity to Main St. as possible.