Hello everybody, I am trying to work up my first deal in Quincy IL, which holds about 60,000 people. I'm very new to the idea of Real Estate Investing, and am driven to make it profitable while working full time. Since I am renting a 3 bed 1 bath house for $850 a month right now, I can't see a better way to get started than to get out of this rental and into a fixer-upper.  Eventually, I would like to have enough cash to work into bigger multi-families expanding across the country and be able to hire managers. That being said, I've read that you should have a plan and process to find what you are looking for. For me, it is a single family ranch style home with 2/3 beds and 1.5/2 baths that smells funny and needs the carpet ripped out. I'm willing to live in a fixer upper, put sweat equity into it for two years, then move on to the next to start.

My problem is that most of these homes I come across are 20 min out of town, have been on the market for a while, and are $115k. These homes seem to be priced at what they are worth, but I'm concerned with owning one so far away from the large population. I'm actively searching for auctions and have been looking for more ways to find these sales before they hit Zillow or Realtor. I've only spoken with one Realtor, who gave me quite a bit of good information on how to find these homes, but I want to know more.  According to the Realtor I spoke with, there are 5 people he has on speed dial for when he comes across a deal like what I am looking for, so I need to speedy finding them.  

I am as green as they come, but very driven and currently obsessed with figuring out how to work Real Estate in my local area. All ideas are welcome, I'm looking forward to tips and tricks to hack the small town Real Estate market, where everyone is trying to flip houses!