I'm still definitely a "nubie" but the way I have started is by driving my home town, looking for "distressed" houses (houses that obviously need work, overgrown yards, mail/newspapers piling up, etc.) take down the address, look up the owner info on your county assessor's website, then direct mailing these people that I want to buy their house.

In my opinion, the mulch alone adds a lot to a yard and the fact that the hard part is done (digging up the grass and adding a planting area) will help with buyers.

Add in the signing of a contract and sticking a sign in the yard, and this is what most real estate agents do.Of course, the good ones do a lot more... :)

And, to those who carry, if you are a target and the bad guy knows you carry, you dounderstand that you can be taken out at a 100 yards easily at any time, right?

I know my parents have 3,000 shares that got reissued to them 5 different times in the same year when everyone was in super growth mode (BofA is practically in my back yard, Wachovia wanted to be seen as competitive).Now that that growth through gobbling up the smaller fish seems to have run its course, investors are holding on and look for their returns the solid, old fashioned way.

But if you want to live in a home with a garage, pets, and a yard, I think you will be more likely to want an SFR.Again, I don't have any data to prove any of the above (except for the unlinked piece about a rush to build apartments in Denver), so fire away.

One day I was in my back yard and I noticed some small cracking in the brick, (house is slump block) I didn't think much about it, but it seems to be getting worse.

Please see HOA forum

No one lives in the house and the yard has never taken care of by the owners.

Also a working dog/breed - so needs a yard or good walks.