Perhaps stay in touch and build a relationship to leverage knowledge but find another knowledgable broker in your target market. 

Build relationships and see if you can find someone to partner with to get things going.

Cap rate won't matter.Hopefully you have a relationship with an agent in the local market who can help you find comps; especially if the agent knows you plan more / future investing in the market and could throw more business their way.2 years is plenty of time.DISCLAIMER: I am not an investor so take my inexperienced advice for what it's worth.

Long-term, buy & hold is a great strategy - I've always been a firm believer that you have the upper hand with these properties in the investment field because you have the advantage of being first in an area then being able to wait for appreciation for whenever you want to sell "when the time is right".Often times, these rental properties also don't involve the full scale upgrades (less money out-right) that you would need in a traditional fix-&-flip in order to hit projected ARV's.The one draw-back here is out-sourcing your rentals to a property management company - which finding the right one for the right price can take some time to vet - or else managing the property yourself, in which case you will need to start building relationships with contractors to ensure proper repairs are being done and the needs of your tenants are being met.You can do buy & holds out of state easily, too, just find the right market that is land-lord friendly (for example, mid-west: Indiana), and I think its fair to say you could do well long-term with the right properties!

*This post does not create an attorney-client or CPA-client relationship. 

Build your relationships now...not after you submit an offer.

If you don’t know what Sphere of Influence means, it’s just basically everyone you already know and have some sort of relationship with.

I have done commercial (office condos) but do not have a relationship with Barshop-oles.

Thanks John, sound easy enough...are mutual bank accounts set up for this type of relationship usually?

Follow up, build a relationship, and don't try to get their pocket deals from day one.