Today news came out that NYC owes health benefits to its retired employees to the tune of ~99B! 

This information can usually be found online and in news articles. 

Investment Info:Small multi-family (2-4 units) buy & hold investment in Newport News.

That's the good news. 

@Leo PoonI assume you're asking about the apartment or rental vacancy rate.There are multiple sites, blogs, news articles that will tell you about the health of a rental market.

@Andrew Mokotoff That's news to me that the laws favor the landlord in NJ.

I look at the business news all the time to see which companies are coming here, who is thinking of doing what around the area etc. 

However, it looks like you've been around and on BiggerPockets for a while, so I doubt much would be news to you.Also, not sure what area you are from, but in my area it wasn't easy finding a lender to loan on a vacant piece of land.

Wait for real news, then invest.

@Joseph Abbott You have to start first, you start off by yourself renovation properties, helping homeowners, making new friends, meeting powerful people in the city.A year goes by, your adding people to your business to do work, now you have a team, saving money up, paying off debt, your business name is known a little in the area, you bought a few homes for cash flow, you met investors that can fund your ideas, your taking people out for dinner, your at the the REI groups branding your company3 years in, Now people know you around the city, showing them you do good work, you paid off your debt, saved up some money for starting  a Real Estate Development Company, you met city officials and political people within the city, you get in the news papers, your active the in community, you have a full team that takes care of your contracting company, your making money from houses and the construction company, now you are working on developing blocks, doing big projects in the city and a real estate investor.Now this can take less than 3 years but may take 5 years or more I don't know but what I am saying is with a plan to start, and starting TODAY as a carpenter gets you closer to your goals of being a developer and rebuilding neighborhoods.