I'm a local central Houston Real estate agent, investor and developer.

Looking forward to meeting local investors and hearing new ideas!

Being an agent who literally just put a FSBO under contract for some first time home buyers I will say this and hope it helps.You can list on Zillow easily, and you can probably pay to be listed on your local MLS.

We have been going to local meetups instead to network for our construction and development business as a way to build capital and partner with other investors.

I’m a local agent/investor and specialize in small multifamily purchases. 

I'm local to the Chicago market and would love to help out.

We were not first-time investors but what we learned about asset protection was from investing OOS.The other thing we learned about investing OOS was to treat it as if you were local. 

In the meantime, connect with local investors to see what has worked for them regarding house hack deals. 

If you're seeing more price points that are higher than the norm typically it means that either the market is shifting gradually up or that there's multiple people involved in that deal "chain" before it gets to you and everyone is adding their markup.My advice would be to attend a few local meetups to brush shoulders with other investors to pick their brain about whats working in your market AND to start marketing direct to sellers instead of trying to get the deals from wholesalers. 

Local or national groups could be a good option.