I've been using ziprealty.com to scour the neighborhood. You can see how long the house has been sitting on the market and how many price reductions they've had. I also use the online tax assessor's link to see what the sales price was originally. Some very interesting stuff!
The Federal goverment has designated go zones in the area's that were affected by hurricane Katrina. The program encourages investors to buy homes to RENT or buildings for business use; not only are the interest rates lower but the total cost of the property up to 200k can be depreciated by 50% in the first year. So if you are in a 33% bracket and buy a house to lease, you can wind up taking a $33,000 business deduction off your AGI. Not all homes and business eligible but I am going to check it out.
