Tenants can help pay the bills -- or create more. (Photo: iStockphoto)

In my last post, I told you how we ended up “reluctant” -- and long-distance -- landlords. For the past year, we hoped the people living in our Memphis-area house would buy it. But they defaulted on their lease-purchase contract and left us with a major clean-up.

They also left us with our first lesson. Don’t expect that tenants will treat your house with any respect at all, especially if they don’t have a deposit hanging in the balance …Full Story

Our Memphis home has been badly treated by tenants.

Call me the reluctant landlord.

Our story starts simply enough: My husband got a new job in the Memphis area. It was a big pay bump from his current position, and we’d be closer to our families. So we jumped at the chance. We bought a great house, thinking we’d be there for years. We imagined our kids growing up there, big family dinners and a bright future …Full Story

Books are nice, but they do tend to stack up. (Photo: iStockphoto)

An elite prep school in Ashburnham, Mass., has upset bibliophiles everywhere by exchanging its 20,000-volume book collection for a digital database of books that holds millions of titles, says NPR.org …Full Story

Many people are hoping they'll qualify for the expanded home buyer credit. (Photo: iStockphoto)

Last week, President Barack Obama signed the “Worker, Homeownership, and Business Assistance Act of 2009,” which extends the $8,000 tax credit available to “first-time” home buyers and adds a tax credit of up to $6,500 for repeat or move-up buyers. The tax credits are available to those who purchase a primary home, and aren’t available to buyers of investment or vacation homes …Full Story

Overly scary Halloween decor can come back to haunt home sellers. (Photo: iStockphoto)

This year, my 6-year-old daughters have been begging me to up the ante with our Halloween decorations. I have some Halloween décor, but most of it are fairly tasteful displays of the season, like a spray of purple, green and orange pumpkin lights around the door, two pumpkins that my daughters chose at a local pumpkin patch, and a brightly colored "Trick or Treat" sign on the front door …Full Story

When I drill, I'll drill into a stud -- unlike my home's builder, who installed our closet system into drywall. (Photo: iStockphoto)

I once read that every woman should own her own cordless, 18-volt drill. I've never been much of a do-it-yourselfer, and don't know much about tools, but I am starting to think that the sentiment is right on …Full Story

The rule of thumb in my house seems to be -- the minute you make one improvement to the home, something else will go horribly wrong.

That's just what happened to me yesterday, and being totally inept and frustrated when it comes to do-it-yourself stuff, I just had to blog about it …Full Story

An Ethan Allen quiz paired me with a"green tea" style of furnishings.

I really loved Pat's post last week about the Facebook quiz that tells you what your "house sign" is. Like Pat, the quiz told me -- a true suburban, walk-in-the-woods type of gal, that my ideal home is a lofty apartment on Park Avenue. This is for a person who gets butterflies in her stomach whenever she has to take the New Jersey Transit train into Manhattan. Not quite on the mark …Full Story

The 2010 Farmers' Alamanc predicts that about three-quarters of the U.S. will experience below-average temperatures this winter. (Photo: farmersalmanac.com)

Fall really seems to have arrived in my neck of the woods, the northeast. Today, it's downright chilly and the skies are already looking bleak and gray. It makes me wonder how high my home's heating bills will be this winter, and whether I should think about getting some weatherizing done on my home or at least stock up on some long johns before those cold winter days hit.  …Full Story

Having window treatments installed by pros can get expensive. (Photo: iStockphoto)

Upgrading a home can be difficult -- and expensive -- if you have absolutely no do-it-yourself skills. I fall into that category.

Recently, while vacuuming, I accidentally caught our window treatments in the vacuum, causing the drapes and the curtain rod to come crashing down. (A testament to my klutziness, I'd say.) So now, I am hoping to put in new window treatments, but am thinking about replacing the long draperies that I had with faux wood blinds, with the hope that they will let in more light. (When the draperies came down, I noticed that the room is now a lot brighter than it once was.) …Full Story