You earned nothing and have nothing to deduct.You might have had expenses (driving around, fees already paid and not recoverable) that can be deducted.The simple version of the rule is money actually spent on business activities might be something you can deduct.

Take active investors to lunch and pick their brain.Once you do this enough you will have a sense of direction.

Now is a great time to "Find and Assign" some deals.Forget about the trying to be a real estate investor, stop crunching numbers, forget about theory, forget about learning about short sales, equity purchases and all of that stuff and just start asking my favorite question."

Hill said McLeod told investigators that he "started out honestly but along the way began skimming the equity" from refinanced homes.McLeod, 31, of Gaithersburg, pleaded guilty to felony theft, embezzlement and prohibited activities while acting as a foreclosure consultant.

Also, I am looking more for active real estate investors in these areas.

These neighborhoods are typically more active for wholesaling/rehabbing than the upper middle class suberbia.

Good luck and look forward to having you as an active member of BP.

- Barney Zick is one of my favorites.

I'm less in touch with other peninsula towns and I'm really out of touch with the San Jose and San Francisco areas.I guess what all that says is that since I'm not active in my area, I only know my very immediate market by osmosis and have a small idea of some other local communities via the news.

It hasn't been as hard on me as on my wife because I was a bit more accepting of what I've seen coming for the past year or so.Anytime I think of dogs I'm always reminded of one of my favorite quotes from Mark Twain (my favorite writer) along the lines of;"hen you get to heaven leave your dog outside, heaven goes by favor, if it went by merit, the dog would go in, and you would stay out."