We've had success managing properties in smaller towns and keeping the occupancy high, but it's something to be aware of. 

Quote from @Adam Czachor: If you're going to be an absentee landlord, I would start by looking for highly skilled property managers that can handle whatever you purchase.

As I mentioned this is my first property and I got to this point without too many questions since my realtor was really helpful, but my property manager wasn't as helpful and she mentioned that I should discuss this with my insurance agent, That I don't really have one reference to trust, so also if anyone has a good insurance agent from Utah it can be helpful.

Overall, there is probably enough housing in the US for everyone but no one wants to live in Northeast Iowa or Central Mississippi so there's a mismatch between available housing and where people want to live.

when looking to go local I would consider a house hack.

How far do traveling nurses prefer to be from the hospital, the houses I'm looking at range from 15 minutes away to 5 minutes away.

How about a management company to handle all these for liability purposes.If we decide to go with a series LLC structure for our real estate investing, where should our management company (to deal with tenants, manage rent, deals with expenses, etc) will fall into?

The house on one side is nearly 500k and the house on the other side is about 700k.

It is a lot of traditional sales.Go on the websites of Sirva, Sedgewick, ALE, CRS, and others and submit your housing to them.

However, I am wanting to take the abandoned houses and revamp the town.