I live in San Francisco itself, in a historically blue collar neighborhood (the Excelsior) and there are no duplexes under 900k at list price, all of which get overbid.

I'm just starting with three multi-families in the historic area here.

Cash buyer, might be good as the seller is in a slow market, get a better deal and buy and hold, especially if it's a sought after neighborhood.Neighborhood markets need more investigation, available properties, rents, demand, historic appreciation and location with respect to economic centers.Many foreclosures in a concentrated area should have a reason buyers fail in a geographic area.

It's an hour away from Austin so it's only a minor detour, and the riverwalk, Alamo, and historic downtown are well worth the trip.

I can find pretty easily historic data on employment, population, and even building permits, but I cannot seem to find any info on absorption for various markets.

Our agent is responsive, but doesn't provide much of input or recommendations from the investing perspective.Is the Chicago market going through a bad time to invest, or is this the historical mean in the area?  

By the way, in my opinion, one of the single greatest benefits of having an effective accounting/management system is that you build your own historical data to benchmark against.  

Historically every time that happened with gold the price for one ounce is almost equal to the dow jones industrial average.

Is it because it has historically attracted a lot of undocumented immigrants?

typically parks have historically traded at 9-11% range.