One day, out of the blue, he approached me and told me that he was planning to retire and move to Florida.

And those that sell are either discounted if higher end, or have a blue collar target market.Backstory now done, let me point out the benefit to the buy-and-hold'ers out there that have seen more challenging economic headwinds in their investment markets.Because the areas homes are selling for less, this is grounds for a re-assessment of value for the purpose of tax adjustment. 

I am talking blue collar rentals.

2 areas with long term appreciation upcoming that I like:River districtUNCC area/along blue line extension

Gladstone, Lee's Summit, Liberty, Parkville, Blue Springs, and Kansas City (North of the river only), will generally have better properties, but they will cost more.

@Adam McCarthy,  I attempted to reply to both you and rebecca in a single post, but couldn't figure out how to add you both in there as the blue highlighted link.  

Mine is through that big blue logo on each post and my signature line.

The majority of which commuted from OP, Lees Summit, Blue Springs, Lenexa, and Olathe.I am very interested to learn more about your thoughts on some decent areas (low crime, decent schools) in which a decent rent to purchase price ratio can be obtained.I am a cash buyer looking to purchase a SFR between $50 - $60K.  

However, my blue collar job and our one bedroom apartment doesn't do the trick...which is why I ended up here.Looking forward,  Stephen

Check out the book "Pitch Anything", it helped me with thought process when speaking to strangers out of the blue, it gives you a few "frames" of reference and directions to take conversations.