What I find a bit interesting is people won’t consider buying a rental in a D-class neighborhood in their own city, but open to buying D-class 2000 miles away.

I can tell you what people here have done to set themselves up for retirement.

Still lots of people and companies moving here. 

Send him a letter, emphasize that you are personally yourself the end-buyer, include proof of funds, include something attesting to you being financeable (unless your proof of funds is for the full cash purchase price).If he owns 20 local businesses, good chance he's in at least one chamber of commerce, and if he's not, he 100% knows people that are, who will spill the beans and offer to do an intro if you mention you're interested in buying a gas station over a beer or a meal (there's probably like 3 people in that city that fit this description, why not get introduced to all 3?)

Sadly, it sometimes gets a bad rap because of people who lose their shirt because they were gullible and then they blame the overseas professionals and suggest they're all scammers instead of blaming themselves from being naive.

This is one spot where picking up the phone and calling people works very well.

If there are no studios, I’d be a little wary unless you know for sure your demographic will be solo travelers, couples, or people working remotely. 

These FSBO's are usually idiots, or think other people are from my personal experience. 

The architect and I have been thinking the exact same thing, with all the people looking to build/ live in this area we could sell just about anything under 500k instantly.

We were supposed to save a lot of money by laying off our AP staff here, but we actually ended up having to keep one of those people.