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Are you a first time buyer who wants orthoevra buy a castle, but can only afford a drawbridge? When your real estate agent takes you to see tiny houses student consolidation loans you can only just afford, do you say that it's too much like the one that your great-grandpa lived in?

Then, do you go all glassy-eyed and point to the two-story custom built home with the double garage across the road and look wistfully at the hot tub?

Yes, well......Remember when you passed your driving test and you saved up to buy your first car? You wanted a candy-apple red Corvette that was a standard with instant car insurance quote leather seats. However, you settled for a beaten up old Volkswagen that needed a paint job AND it was an automatic. Are you still driving that car now? No.

Get the picture?

A small home gets you a piece of realty in the coveted property market of which you are currently NOT a member. The little house insurance will escalate at the same rate (more or less) as the gorgeous house. that means the gorgeous house that you are aiming for will never escalate further out of your reach because you have an escalating house yourself.

If the house is really small, just play up to its cuteness. You can hang fairy-tale shutters on the front windows, and buy some wavy edged wooden trim for the eaves of the roof.

Buy cobblestones and wind a little path up to the front door; attach window boxes under the windows and paint them to match the shutters. Grow plants in the window box that will still bloom in winter, like silver ferns or yellow-leafed evergreen and make sure you have an ivy trailing down from each box.

When you have finished painting it all up and are ready to sell it, plant pansies in the boxes. A little old accident at work boomer couple will fall in love with it and they only wanted two bedrooms anyway! (Baby boomers reach 65 and start to retire in 2011.)

If you want to make even more profit and you are handy with an electric saw, you could build a garage or order a modular kit and make one. There are many inexpensive ways to add profit to a home. Some of them include painting it inside and out, adding a greenhouse, building a deck, and making an outdoor eating area.

You can give the kitchen a lift by replacing cabinet doors for as little as $20 each. If you paint your home, keep it all white, cream, or very pale, to give it a spacious look.

House prices are at their cheapest for years, and mortgage interest rates are very low. Get pre-approved for fixed rate financing so that your monthly payments won't go up. Choose a house now and you will have it renovated in time for the next boom!

Then you can buy the Corvette.

Maryland's first "EcoBroker" designated Realtor, Branden Schroeder. To search