The basement finished area (not really just a dry walled wall and paint but not livable space) bringing the appraised value of the home to $330,000.00.

The big boys did play a roll in accelerating the correction in certain markets, but only marginally (in my opinion) until that inventory dried up and prices returned to normal. 

I'm not sure how I would market this understanding without one-on-one meetings that I would need to quit my job to have... all in the hope people would see the benefit of paying for a service versus pulling their hair out at year end tax time. 

As soon as the words come out of their mouth with anything to do with my money they go to the bottom of the list.My best investors tell me make all the money you want I just want the deal.In fact if the seller has no money and they need to throw in 500 more to close it they don't care.They get the deal done and make their money and move onto the next deal.Had an investor a few months ago that kept splitting hairs on a commercial short sale with the bank over a few thousand.It was very frustrating dealing with this person.They wasted a bunch of time.Another investor came in and had cash and closed in 7 days.Said the deal was great enough for them and didn't care.Investors can try to screw brokers and agents on one or two deals but if you will be in this game for any length of time it will cost you much,much more in the long run.I control my money by controlling the deals.If you feel I am getting overpaid you will lose out on the deal.I have tons of investors waiting to purchase.If you have a broker/agent that will allow themselves to be ran over by people they aren't worth much anyways.

If I really need to move it, I simply lower the price until it's out of my hair....pretty simple....and now they want to call that wholesaling if it is sold to some RE operator....Hmmmm, silly to me.But Okay....

Do you know what kind of termites you have (i.e. dry wood, subterranean, etc)?

Regular homebuyer type stuff that has no hair on it where you can't get into a mess and an E and O claim doing the creative type deals.

You need to be able to roll up with a large order and show impressive monthly buying capacity before the big guys will even talk to you about any kind of statistically meaningful discount.... and even at that point, the discounts really only mean something BECAUSE you're buying in gross bulk and saving $2/board on drywall adds up when you're ordering by the truck load every other week.The other huge factor is that when you get to where you CAN negotiate for these kind of discounts, you've thoroughly worn out the service capacity of big box stores like Lowes and if you have to deal with one more botched, incomplete delivery or broken board of 'rock you're going to tear your hair out... then the service and delivery capabilities of a real supply house starts making a big difference to you.

Happy New Year LynnOK ,,,the matter of shower drains,,,The most common cause of a shower drain stoppage in my experience has been long hair in the drain as a result of our dear womenfolk shampooing in the shower.In all fairness a guys hair will clog it up too,,,especially if he's a wanna be Rock Star ,,,hair is hair.!!!!

The point I want to underscore is that the idea that hoarding dollars and "keeping your powder dry" was the reason this thread was started.