No offense to your mother, but if she had been raising the rent every year over the last 20 years, she'd be sitting on a few million instead of pondering her retirement plan. 

Hey @Craig Harris,I'm with Bill on this one, inventory is already pretty low in both KCMO and KCK (for areas that you don't mind owning in) you could search and search for the 2% rule but how long will your money be sitting while you do that.  

Give your kids a pile of clutter that's been sitting in your basement and have them hose a yard sale (or set up at a flea market).

The joists sit on the sill and gravity does the rest but in order to jack the house you need to brace with temp beams and jack as far out on the joists as possible.

He's from out of state and has just been sitting on these parcels for years.

I'm not sure of the laws in your state, but If you are serious about purchasing it; it's time to sit down with a good local real estate attorney for a "free" or "half-priced" consultation.

Considering you are in college you have a HUGE opportunity that most people don't have, also if you are in the military you have just as big of an opportunity but in a completely different way.If you are interested we can sit down and talk and I can try to help you find some ways that might work for you.

I think you have to sit tight and let this play out, there simply isn't much you can do.  

For us, we feel it's just way too competitive right now w/the bidding wars, we're going to just sit it out.

I know that you can do it over a weekend if you'd like to sit in a room for ten hours on Saturday and Sunday.